


Higher Ground

by PunkHazard



Series: Kent [7]
Category: Wolf 359 (Radio)
Genre: Corporate Espionage, F/F, M/M, Post-Canon, Slice of Life, alien doppelgänger funtimes
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-05-08
Updated: 2020-02-07
Packaged: 2020-02-28 06:06:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 19
Words: 80,318
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18750550
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PunkHazard/pseuds/PunkHazard
Summary: Kepler passes a folder to each crewmember, waiting for them to crack the files open before he speaks. "Our first order of business" he says, standing at the head of the table, "is getting a few programs out of the crossfire. Non-negotiable.""Good afternoon to you too, Colonel." Jacobi grumbles, already reading. "How was your day, Jacobi? Oh, you know, same as always. Thanks for asking, sir, really makes us feel like you care."





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> [higher ground](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4wZ3ZG_Wams) (c) stevie wonder

Three days out from Earth, Kepler calls a meeting, dragging Minkowski, Lovelace, Jacobi and Maxwell to the Sol's conference node. Hera's present as well, tapped into the Sol's communications but not particularly focused on them. He passes a folder to each crewmember, waiting for them to crack the files open before he speaks. "Our first order of business" he says, standing at the head of the table, "is getting a few programs out of the crossfire. Non-negotiable."

"Good afternoon to you too, Colonel." Jacobi grumbles, already reading. "How was your day, Jacobi? Oh, you know, same as always. Thanks for asking, sir, really makes us feel like you care." 

Lovelace flashes him a sideways smile, nudging him on the arm as he flips a page. 

Things have stabilized between him and Kepler, the two of them recovering _most_ of the easy camaraderie they'd shared before arrival on the Hephaestus. Kepler's reapplied some of the pressure that he used to on his (ex-)subordinates, ramping up the demands on their work and time as they drew closer to Earth, both of them not only rising to the occasion but relishing it. Jacobi leans back when Kepler passes behind his chair, indicating something on the page and smirking when the colonel leans over to read. He murmurs a question, then an affirmative when he gets the answer.

" _All_ these programs?" Lovelace asks. Isabel, for her part, has poked and needled and pranked Kepler for the entirety of their trip and he's not only weathered it but retaliated with a playful vengeance that took her breath away. She'd grudgingly come to respect his sense of humor, and their constant one-upping had become more friendly than competitive.

"Global internet access," Kepler answers, stopping behind Maxwell, who's already marking up her files with a green pen, "free electricity to refugee communities, water purification initiatives in... about eighty towns, cities and villages around the world. Couple others, but those are my priority."

The folders contain summaries and dossiers on each of the initiatives he'd listed, and about a half dozen others. Minkowski shuffles a few pages to the front and sets the folder open down on the table. "And how do you propose we do that?"

"Networking, Commander Minkowski."

"Networking," she repeats skeptically.

"Well, you don't do what I have," he says, "for as long as I have without racking up some favors."

"Enough favors to fund... all of those projects?"

"That's what I'm about to find out."

"Holy shit," Lovelace mutters under her breath.

"We," says Kepler, indicating himself, Jacobi and Maxwell with a casual tip of his head, "were in the field less than twenty percent of the time. What did you think I was doing the other eighty?"

"Wining, dining, and schmoozing," Jacobi quips. 

"That is pretty much the definition of networking. I also negotiated and oversaw acquisitions and mergers, company restructuring, employee contracts..."

"Don't you have to be a lawyer to do that?" Minkowski asks.

"Yes."

"Really?"

"I ever tell you that I passed the Illinois Bar before I started at Goddard," Kepler drawls, "and then Cutter asked me to do it in New York, California and Florida? I've worked at all our branch headquarters, and I can call in favors from almost every level of management at multiple tech conglomerates." While they gape at him, he settles back into the seat at the head of the table. "Gonna see how many of those are still good."

Maxwell makes a disgruntled sound. "That wasn't in your file."

"That's because you didn't look in Jason Hawking's file."

She whips her phone out of her pocket. "Damnit!"

"Why do you care so much about those charity projects?" After all their time together, Minkowski had never stopped questioning his motives. Warren figured that at some point, it had become more habit than real suspicion, her way to counter his kneejerk impulse to withhold information. "Don't get me wrong, I'm on board, I just didn't think they were something that mattered to _you_." 

Maxwell raises her stylus from her end of the table, waiting for Kepler to acknowledge her to address Minkowski. "Are you guys under the impression that the SI-5 just committed acts of indiscriminate evil?" 

"You mean you didn't?" Lovelace quips. 

"It's more like extremely deliberate acts of evil that would in some form or another advance Goddard's technological progress and leave us in a better position to keep all those public service projects running." Jacobi shrugs, him and Maxwell only present as a formality. They'd been caught up days ago, while Kepler fine-tuned his notes. 

Kepler clears his throat. "Any objections?" 

Lovelace sits up. "Actually--"

"Oh, would you look at that, I don't give a rat's ass about any objections. _Non. Negotiable._ "

Maxwell and Jacobi chime in, a simultaneous, admonishing, " _Sir_." 

"Fine. _What._ "

"I was gonna say that's actually pretty admirable. Why _does_ this matter to you?"

"You have an idea of how we operate, don't you Captain?"

"Sure."

"Programs like these are the ones that make what we did worth doing," he says, voice low. "I didn't sacrifice seven billion people so Cutter can remake humanity in his image, and I'm not letting millions of people become collateral for our little revenge campaign. There are _limits_."

"Okay." Minkowski catches and holds his gaze. "We'll follow your lead on this. Until we reach a point where our goals diverge, we defer to your expertise."

"You don't have to, but I'd appreciate it."

"Kepler, we're on the same side." Minkowski silently relishes the softening of his expression, his relaxing shoulders. "And I'm glad we are."

Jacobi grins at him while he struggles with a response, still so used to being questioned and fought every step of the way that the swerve into polite cooperation is almost too much for him. "Likewise," is what he settles on at last, "Commander Minkowski."

* * *

Once Minkowski and Lovelace step out of the conference node, Jacobi kicks his feet up on the table and crosses his arms behind his head. "What's next?"

Kepler shoves his legs off. "Maxwell," he says. "Time for our check-in."

Setting up her tablet and keyboard, Maxwell also pulls the landline phone from the center of the table closer to her edge of it. The phone is linked directly to the Sol's pulse beacon relay, just the sort of playfully outdated detail Cutter took special pleasure in implementing whenever possible. "I'll get Hera online," she says.

"Think we can get away with an e-mail this time around?" Jacobi asks, chin propped in his hand.

"I'm shocked we even got away with it the first couple times."

"We had the excuse of Wolf 359's radioactivity interfering with the pulse beacon relay when we were closer to the star," Maxwell tells him, still typing. "The failsafes aren't so easy to get past that we can keep getting around them with a text message."

Finally, from the tablet: "And you do just happen to have a very smart friend who can impersonate Marcus Cutter well enough to have his voiceprint disable his dead man's switch and let the top brass believe he's still alive."

Kepler's expression perks and he sits upright, hands clasping on the table in front of him. "Good to have you with us, Hera."

"Hey, Hera."

"Hi Alana!" Much less warmly, but without the chill she had in her voice only a few weeks ago: "Kepler, Jacobi."

"Y'know Hera," Jacobi sits up as well, sliding his chair over to Maxwell's and leaning over her arm to say, "your Cutter impression is no slouch, but your Kepler... that one's money."

"Well... long story short... he makes it... easy."

Jacobi and Maxwell collapse against each other, laughing. 

"Alright," Kepler interrupts after exactly five seconds, "that's enough. Opening the line."

Hera clears her throat-- coughs a few times as her voice drops in pitch and her cadence shifts to imitate Cutter's exact brand of terrifying cheer. "Hello, everyone. Marcus here." Kepler had asked her about a week after the Sol caught up to the Urania to do Cutter's weekly check-ins for them, then spent about an hour nailing down his speech patterns with her. Recordings from the Black Archives helped, but no one else on board had spent as much time listening to Cutter talk. "Just checking in with an update on the work we're doing out on the Hephaestus. Everything is going exactly as planned, and... really, that's all the board needs to know. I trust that you're all running things back on Earth, so until next week... Marcus out."

"Perfect."

There's a long silence, wherein Jacobi considers that as much contempt as Hera had for Kepler and himself, meeting the colonel's exacting (some would say neurotic) standards to such a degree that he would proclaim a performance 'perfect' is pretty rare. Hera takes the opportunity to ask, "What's the point of all this, Kepler? Why don't we just... let them believe whatever they want?"

"You remember what I said about calling in those favors?"

"Sure."

"I'm operating on a certain timeline, and that timeline depends on blindsiding the Goddard Futuristics board. They don't _actually_ need Marcus Cutter to keep the company running, but they sure as hell think they do. So the moment they find out that Cutter's dead, the company will turn upside down. They'll be," Kepler pauses, dragging out the silence while he tries to choose a word that would encapsulate the exact state of Goddard Futuristics when the time comes, "vulnerable to certain offers at that time."

"Like offers to take charitable projects off their hands while they restructure the company."

"I need time to convince their competitors to make the offers, and they'll need time to draw up the contracts. So until we've got all the pieces in place, I'd like to maintain status quo."

Hera makes an understanding sound. "Next week, then?"

"Next week, Hera. Thank you."

* * *

Properly caught in the gravitational field of the Earth, Minkowski's crew moves aboard the Sol and they decouple the ships, leaving the Urania in orbit and landing the Sol camouflaged deep in the forest of an Ohioan national park. They stay through the night and take off just before dawn, Kepler leading them on a long hike over five miles of dense terrain. Normal Earth gravity is a struggle even for the SI-5, the group taking frequent breaks to allow Eiffel to catch his breath. (Dr. Pryce turns out not to need much help at all, her cybernetics taking on the bulk of the work.)

"You're not gonna like this part," Kepler says to Minkowski as they trudge toward a scenic overlook by a trailhead, several cars parked while their owners are still camped out in the woods.

"The part where you hijack a car?" she sighs, watching Eiffel collapse against a tree and Lovelace hand him a pouch of water. 

"The part where we hijack," Jacobi says, " _two_ cars."

"The closest town is forty miles away," Kepler says mildly, referencing his phone, "so we'll just leave it there when we rent another one. Owners can hitch a ride with someone else." He points at a relatively clean white sedan parked next to a red minivan, and a gray hatchback nestled between two SUVs. Cars parked in a cluster usually arrived in a group, so at least the spare drivers might also be friends. "Jacobi, Maxwell?"

"We can bring them back," Minkowski says, frowning as the two operatives immediately set to work breaking into and hotwiring the vehicles. "Before the owners notice they're missing."

"Yeah," Kepler scoffs, leaning against the roof of a beat-up old Subaru, "and we'll top off their gas and get the interiors reupholstered while we're at it."

"Kepler, I'm serious."

"So am I. If we're gonna risk coming back and getting caught, we might as well go all the way."

Minkowski doesn't bother looking to Lovelace for help, knowing the other woman would take Kepler's side on this. Expediency always wins out over slightly inconveniencing total strangers with her. "Can we at least leave a note?"

Kepler decides after a moment that that's a reasonable compromise, and he produces a small notebook and a marker from the inner pocket of his jacket. _Your vehicle has been appropriated by federal agents in pursuit of a criminal element,_ he scrawls on two sheets. "Look up the address of a car rental in Brecksville, would you?" _They can be recovered at the ___ rental agency in Brecksville, OH. Thank you for your service to the US government._

Minkowski snorts when she reads the notes, but flashes him an address on her own phone. "Here."

Kepler fills in the last word on both notes, and waits for Jacobi and Maxwell to pull the cars out of their spaces before he leaves the sheets, weighed down by rocks. Maxwell clambers out of the sedan, vacating the driver's seat for Minkowski, and Jacobi shuffles over to the passenger's side of the hatchback to make space for Kepler. Pryce piles into the hatchback with Maxwell, and Lovelace slides into the sedan with Eiffel. "We'll meet in town," Kepler says to Minkowski, rolling his window down. "I think we can fit everyone in an SUV."

"And then?"

"Then Stroudsburg, Pennsylvania. I have a place there."

Lovelace leans forward in her seat, peering around Minkowski to look at him. "What do you have a place in Pennsylvania for?"

"It's not Vermont or the Alps," Kepler says, "but it's close to some decent slopes in the winter."

"And fireworks are legal out there," Jacobi yells.

Kepler gives her a long-suffering look. "And fireworks are legal out there."

* * *

A six-and-a-half hour drive later, the group straggles into a quaint little home in downtown Stroudsburg and kicks off their shoes in the entrance. "Bed," Kepler says, pointing at a closed door, then another one, then toward the living room, "bed, pull-out couch. Make yourselves at home. Jacobi, Maxwell: you're with me."

"Are we setting up a cot?" Maxwell asks, ducking into the master bedroom after him. 

Kepler hooks his foot under a frame beneath his bed and drags a mattress half out. Then he immediately heads for the closet to retrieve a change of clothes, jerking his head over his shoulder to prompt Jacobi and Maxwell to help themselves. 

"Uh..."

"I'm leaving tonight for New York," he clarifies, stopping in the doorway to his en-suite bathroom. "You and Jacobi can work out who gets what, but in the meantime, I need a shower and a nap. Desk is over there, drawers are empty."

"Why?" Jacobi asks.

"Paying someone a visit." Before Daniel can ask anything else, Kepler ducks inside and shuts the door behind him.

Jacobi raids the closet while the sound of running water emanates from the bathroom, selecting a t-shirt and a pair of oversized gray joggers for Maxwell, then a t-shirt and a pair of jeans for himself. Black trunks for both of them, from an unopened packet he finds in the back of Kepler's underwear drawer. Daniel tries not to think too hard about Kepler's underwear drawer, and pokes his head out the door instead to see Minkowski and Eiffel browsing the freezer.

"Anything good?"

"Hot Pockets and Pizza Bites," Eiffel says cheerfully. "Not sure what they are, but I'm not gonna say no to cheese and sauce. I didn't know the colonel was a junk food kinda guy, but I'm kinda liking it."

"I'm defrosting the steaks," Minkowski says as Eiffel takes the entire box of Pizza Bites and moves to preheat the oven. She intercepts him before he reaches for the dials, first emptying the oven of a variety of trays, pots and pans before she allows him to slide in the tray. "Hey, Jacobi?"

"Yeah?"

She comes closer, pulling him out of the doorway and around the corner. "Doesn't this place seem a little big for one person?" she asks, voice lowered. "And this doesn't really look like food Kepler eats."

Jacobi's learned over the years that noticing Kepler's incongruities is sometimes more dangerous than letting them slide, though he can sympathize with the impulse to go digging. "Maybe it's a timeshare," he says. "We were out here a year before Maxwell joined, looks exactly the same."

"You really think that guy's willing to share?"

"You could ask."

Minkowski shudders at the thought. "Yeah, right." 

"That's what I thought."

"Good looking out, Jacobi."

"I'll see you later, Commander."

Daniel heads back just in time to see Kepler step out of the bathroom, steam still rolling off his shoulders as he towels off his hair. Maxwell's already claimed the desk and she barely looks up to acknowledge them, far too happy to be back online to get into any kind of proper conversation. It's a familiar enough sight that Jacobi just waits for Kepler to look at him, sleepy and relaxed, to ask, "Can I come?"

"No."

Kepler's too tired to really fight him on it so Jacobi presses his advantage as the other man scrubs his face with the towel and moves for the bed. "Why not?" Daniel asks, scooping up the clothes he'd claimed from the closet as Warren sits on the edge of his mattress and pulls on his shirt. "I don't have any prep I can do here, I like New York, and it's not a short drive. We could switch off."

"You don't have to come."

"That makes me think it's a _personal_ trip, not business, which means I _definitely_ wanna come."

"And which is why I don't want you to."

"Warren..."

" _No,_ Mr. Jacobi."

Glancing out the door, Jacobi watches Lovelace plop a backpack down on the floor in the foyer before she heads for the bathroom. " _Lovelace_ is going with you?"

"Yeah, she's--"

"So why can't I go with you?"

"Lovelace is from Brooklyn. She has connections there too."

Jacobi kicks lightly at his shin while Kepler sets an alarm on his phone. "You drove us all out here and you're getting behind the wheel again? Do you _want_ to crash?"

"We switched off," Kepler deflects.

Jacobi exhales slowly, his impulse to step into the warm, familiar role of right-hand man wrestling with the idea that Kepler's decided to lone-wolf this and he's going to get killed doing it, just like he got killed trying to stop Marcus Cutter by himself on the Hephaestus. Daniel didn't think he'd ever miss the days Kepler would hand off every tedious chore to his subordinates while he focused on his big picture, but at least back then, Jacobi never worried that the man would die of exhaustion. "For the last hour when you couldn't even keep your _eyes_ open," he hisses, " _sir_. It's another two-hour drive, so let me come with."

Kepler's eyes flicker to a spot over Jacobi's shoulder-- the bathroom mirror, to see that Maxwell's turned her attention from her computer to their conversation. "Jacobi--" 

"We're a _team_ ," Daniel reminds him. It bears repeating. Kepler seems to have reconfigured his approach to both crews: if he can't withhold information when he asks them to do something, he might as well do it himself. 

"Okay." Kepler rakes his fingers through his hair, pushing his still-damp fringe away from his forehead and slicking it back. "Go get cleaned up, we leave at 1800."


	2. Chapter 2

Kepler's alarm goes off right by Jacobi's ear. His phone had slipped off the edge of the mattress at some point in the last two hours, landing near Jacobi's pillow, and Daniel groans softly as he rolls over to dismiss the alert. Kepler shuffles over to peer down at him over the curve of his arm and the edge of the bed, bleary-eyed and hair tousled. They exchange tired looks, Warren finally sitting up and swinging his legs over the edge of his bed to poke Daniel in the ribs with his foot. 

Maxwell turns her seat, the bright blue eye of Hera's shell lit up on the table beside her. "Morning," Hera chirps, happy just to be back in the company of the crew, "sleepyheads!"

"Welcome to Pennsylvania," Kepler replies. He eyes the other shell, this one plugged into Maxwell's laptop and glowing a dim, pulsing orange as Invictus establishes his connection. 

Jacobi groans louder.

"Don't wire the house just yet," Kepler says to Maxwell, yawning. "This won't be our permanent base of operations." He steps over Jacobi when the other man remains unresponsive to his prodding, reluctance in the deliberate slowness of his movements but the usual stubborn purpose to them as he strides to the closet and pulls out a military jacket. Dark gray and well-fitted, he shrugs it on over his t-shirt, zips it halfway, and goes back into the closet for a pair of socks. 

"Copy that," says Maxwell, thumbing a switch on Vic's shell and smiling mildly when the orange light stabilizes and he comes online with a cheerful beep. Months later and he's still uninterested in picking a voice; Alana could almost blame Kepler for his willingness to interpret on the AI's behalf, but she'd never complain about someone treating an AI kindly. She can (and has) complained at length about his ability to induce _dependence_. Half the time it isn't even intentional, just a natural byproduct of his reliability and initiative.

"Car's in the garage." Kepler takes a navy-blue hoodie out of his closet as well and tosses it onto the pull-out mattress, the pullover unfurling over the back of Jacobi's head. "There's food in the fridge, but feel free to stock up. We'll be here at least a week, no more than two. You have my new number?"

He's used to concealing his edges, too, diplomacy to smooth over that razor-sharp perception, a long-burning fuse to obscure his explosive, vindictive temper. Around Jacobi and Maxwell, he's taken to hiding very little. They're neither afraid of him nor dismissive and given that he's adopted a policy of relative transparency, he has no reason to employ either intimidation _or_ placation tactics. 

Lately, Maxwell's sure that she can see the code behind all the operative, values that Kepler had kept well hidden slowly revealed as he loses his reasons to suppress them. She had tinkered with all their phones their first night back on Earth, disabled the tracking and slotted in the SIM cards included with their cover dossiers. "I have it."

"I'll see you soon, then. Hook Vic up to our phones when you can." Crouching by Jacobi, he pats the younger man lightly between the shoulder blades, then shakes him. "You still up for this?"

"Yeah, yeah, I'm up." Having spent the last few minutes gathering himself, Jacobi picks his face off the pillow and rolls smoothly to his feet, shrugs on the hoodie, pushing the sleeves to his elbows. "Let's go."

* * *

"Hey," says Lovelace two hours into the trip as they drive in intermittent starts and stops through uptown Manhattan, leaning onto the armrest between the driver and passenger seats, "what's with the place in Stroudsburg? Seems pretty lived-in for a safehouse."

Jacobi's at the wheel, sneaking looks at Kepler whenever they're stopped, which is often on a Friday night in the city. Isabel takes a moment to savor that thought, the familiarity of it after too many rotations in space where time seemed to be nothing more than an abstract concept. 

"Neighbor cleans it once every two weeks," Kepler says. "In exchange, her family and friends use it whenever they're in town."

"You have a lot of places like that?"

"Some. Rent most of 'em out."

"Really?"

"Places," Kepler says thoughtfully, "tend to fall apart if they're not being used. There are a few locations only I know about, but they won't fit seven people."

"And," Lovelace drawls, "what're we doing in Hamilton Heights?"

"Visiting an old friend."

" _You_ have friends here?"

"Why wouldn't I?"

"I'm still kinda surprised he has friends at all," Jacobi comments, flashing him a sideways smile as he pulls up to a parking space in front of a nondescript gym, Sugar Hill Boxing Club emblazoned across the awning. Fliers plastered on the door offer classes and conditioning for boxers, martial artists, PX90 enthusiasts, children. It's brightly lit, nearly empty. 

"Go on ahead of me," Kepler says, striding around to the back of the SUV to retrieve a twelve-pack of beer that he'd insisted they pick up along the way.

The gym looks the same from inside as it seemed to from outside, smelling mildly of sweat, the pleather on weight machine seats, and cleaning solvents. Lovelace grins, eyeing a raised boxing ring in one area and the phalanx of treadmills in another. It's one thing to be back on solid ground, immersed in trees and dirt; another thing entirely to be in a public space, in the company of people who have no idea who she is and who have no interest in finding out. It's _glorious._

She and Jacobi stop next to the main desk to wait for Kepler, their backs against the glass counter until someone steps out of the back room. 

"Can I help you?" he asks, wiping his hands on a towel, and he startles when Lovelace turns to face him. 

"Wait," Lovelace gasps, expression breaking out in a grin.

" _Outlaw?_ " The man dives for the latch to a section of the counter, flipping it up to step out and sweep her into an exuberant hug, planting a kiss on her cheek. "Captain Isabel goddamn Lovelace?"

"Will Alvarez?" Thinking back to the conversation they had in the car, Lovelace turns her head, waiting for Alvarez to release her before she asks, "Wait, you know Warren Kepler?"

"Do I know Warren K-- I moved out here from Chicago," he says, laughing. "Back in our day, _everyone_ in our part of South Side knew Warren Kepler. My man, he uh, stood out."

"Understatement," Kepler quips, plunking the carton of beer onto the counter and colliding with Alvarez in an enthusiastic embrace of his own. "You know Captain Isabel Lovelace," he says, voice warm as they pull apart, "and this is my associate, Daniel Jacobi. Alvarez was stationed with Lovelace in... Iraq? I took a chance and figured you might've known each other."

"Yeah, '06 to '08. No había muchos paisanos in the unit, ay? We stuck together." Alvarez extends a hand, shaking Jacobi's with a firm, confident grip that instantly throws him back to 2011. Something familiar about the strength and ease in the gesture, and he pretends, like everyone else in present company, that Kepler _doesn't_ know everything about everyone that can be put in a report. "Good to meet you, Daniel."

"Likewise. How uh," he says, looking between Kepler and this man who's clearly got some kind of history with him, "how do _you two_ know each other?"

"We grew up on the same block," Alvarez says, blithely ignoring Kepler's wince at how easily he reveals that information, "and this guy was over at my place every damn day. We got through high school together, almost got arrested together, started basic training together..."

"Will was the bassist in our funk band," Kepler adds, smugness written all over his face when Alvarez throws him an annoyed look.

"Damnit, Warren, we do _not_ talk about the funk band."

"I listened to some of it," Lovelace pipes up, flashing Kepler a wicked smile. "The bass was on point. Sax? I dunno."

"Blatant lies," Kepler retorts when Alvarez smacks his shoulder. To his old friend: "I don't know why you're still embarrassed about it, we were _great_."

"'Cause you never learned how to be embarrassed about anything in your life," Alvarez hisses, throwing an arm across his shoulders and poking him on the chest, "so I gotta do it for both of us."

Kepler huffs, elbowing him lightly in the ribs but making no move to free himself. They're about the same height but not many men have the ability to make Warren Kepler look _small_ with just the force of their outsized personality, especially given the colonel's own ego. Alvarez is well-built, as befitting a man who runs a gym, in about the same shape that Kepler was before they went to space. "It's good to see you again," Warren murmurs, relaxing into the dynamic the way Jacobi finds himself doing in Maxwell's presence. 

"Hadn't heard from you in years," Alvarez says, dropping his voice, addressing Kepler alone now, "then someone tells me you died and I didn't hear jack about getting anything from your _estate_ , so I figured you had to disappear. It's cool, man. You still could've called."

"I didn't want to get you mixed up with Goddard," Kepler answers, their faces close. For someone who spends so much time being an absolute bastard, the statement sounds shockingly sincere. "Besides, what estate?"

"Wait," Jacobi says, not at all reluctant to interrupt the moment, "so what are we doing _here_?"

"About seven years ago?" Alvarez shakes Kepler, grinning again. "This guy calls me up and I ask, 'How's the private sector treating you?' and he goes, 'I got myself into something shady,' and I'm like, 'Otra vez! How does someone as smart as you keep getting into crazy shit like this?'" 

Trying to pull away, Kepler sighs when the arm around him only tightens, holding him still. Lovelace grins at the sight, just as familiar and endeared to Alvarez's tactile friendliness.

"So I'm trying to open this place up, serve the community, you know, and he says, 'Keep a room for me upstairs,' and I go, 'Sure, if you wanna help me with the down payment on the building,' and he laughs and he says, 'Done.'" Alvarez snorts, shaking his head in disbelief. "Half a day later, a new investor dumps a whole load of cash into the foundation and I close on the property. Saved a room for this guy, but I airBnB it out sometimes to cover the upkeep."

"I had some pull with the legal department at the time," Kepler explains at Jacobi and Lovelace's instantly suspicious looks. "Told my supervisor that it'd be a good investment, so he bought it out under a shell corporation. Right around my promotion. I don't think anyone even remembers it, Goddard's invested in a lot of side projects."

"I thought if he doesn't want to tell me about it, he's got a good reason."

"Something shady," Daniel repeats, staring at Kepler again. He'd never _seemed_ to have doubts about working for Goddard, and all signs pointed to Warren having thoroughly enjoyed the job. Then again, it'd make sense that someone so high up in the company food chain might understand better than anyone the consequences that kind of lifestyle would entail. Given his personality, it'd make sense to have contingencies, contacts, supplies all squirreled away and waiting in case he had to get out. 

"It doesn't get much shadier than Goddard black ops," Kepler says mildly.

"Brother, I got a Goddard _phone_."

"That's why I didn't _call._ "

"Anyway, I've still got that stuff you asked me to hold onto." Alvarez finally releases Kepler, motions them into the office, ducking into a closet and spending a good minute digging through the clutter to crack open a safe and come out with a backpack. "Need to stay a couple days? My mother moved out here last year, she's gonna want to see you."

"For a night, then we should clear out." Kepler catches the pack when Alvarez lobs it to him, unzipping it to check its contents: wallet, counterfeit passport, a set of safety deposit box keys, a pocketknife. A little first-aid kit, tactical flashlight. A fat wad of cash and a length of braided cord. Pretty much everything he'd need to slip into a new identity on unfamiliar turf. "I just came by for my bug-out bag, but I _would_ like to see both Mrs. Alvarezes before we go. How's Maria?"

Alvarez unclips a key from the ring of them at his hip and presses it into Kepler's hand. "She's good. You know I've always got space for you," he says softly, "right? Upstairs, 5F. It's not big, but you three'll figure something out. Let's do lunch tomorrow." 

"Alright. Sounds good." For the first time in a long while, Kepler's expression is relaxed and easy. "I'll be back later," he says, and gestures for Jacobi to follow him out while Lovelace continues the conversation.

* * *

"I can't believe you just bailed out of this guy's life for years and then waltz back in and he's just okay with it," Jacobi grumbles, pulling his hood higher up around his neck. He's always taken pains to maintain the friendships he wants to keep, checking in every few months at most. Anyone he hasn't spoken to in over a year, who hasn't sought him out in a year, Daniel writes off as a lost cause. "Offers you a place to stay. Invites you for _lunch_."

Kepler slings his backpack over one shoulder, looking entirely too civilian in the dark, too harmless, for what Jacobi knows he's capable of. He moves for the car, stashing his bag in it and locking the doors. "Not everyone wants the same things out of a friend that you do, Jacobi."

"You don't have to explain, Colonel. I get it."

"Explain... what."

"You grew up in some pretty tough places," Daniel says, "so you never knew if someone was gonna get themselves killed or arrested, but it happened enough that you learned not to get too _attached_. But you make a friend like that, you always come through for him 'cause he always comes through for you. It's almost cliché."

"Huh."

"Just saying." Jacobi looks at the pavement, frowning. "Wish I had that."

"Maxwell doesn't count all of a sudden?"

"From _you_."

"Jacobi."

"What."

"You do. You always did." The tone prompts him to look up and Kepler catches his eye, holding his gaze, expression serious. "How many times have we put our asses on the line for each other? I'll tell you now that it's more than I've done for anyone else."

"How many times did you _withhold information_ from him," Jacobi growls, jerking a thumb over his shoulder, "that got his friend killed?"

"You don't have to be Will Alvarez, Daniel. You couldn't be if you tried."

"Why?"

"'Cause I've been withholding information from him for _seven years_ ," Kepler says, pointing at himself, "and I got his best friend killed."

And just like that, he'd welcomed Kepler back into his life. Alvarez really was setting a terrible standard. Daniel groans, rubbing his face before he rakes his nails across his buzzed scalp. "Okay, I get the point. You can stop lawyering me."

"I can't deny who I am, Jacobi!"

"Leave me alone! I'm getting a Jamaican beef patty." Jacobi ducks away from the hand Kepler tries to put on his shoulder, putting up a cursory resistance before he gives up and moves within reach, settling under Warren's arm and leaning into his side as they start down the street. He shoves both hands into the front pocket of his hoodie. "Those are big around here, right?"

"They're pretty good from the bodega two blocks down and on your left." Kepler's arm tenses around his neck, pulling him toward the crosswalk. "Luis's Corner Deli, if it's still there."

"Why're you calling a deli a bodega?" 

"Delis prepare food, bodegas sell groceries. Luis's does both. They're used interchangeably."

"Alright, Encyclopedia Brown." Jacobi grins at the sound of Kepler's snort, looking up at him as they walk. "You wanna get a patty with me?"

Kepler's teeth flash in the dim light of the streetlamp. "I thought you'd never ask."

* * *

Later, a half-eaten beef patty in one hand and condensation-covered can of Arizona iced tea in the other, they loiter outside the boxing club until the last gym-goer leaves for the night. "Maybe if you stopped treating your people like they're your _tools_ ," Daniel counters in response to some comment Kepler makes about mutineers, how fun they are, "they wouldn't mutiny quite so much."

He hadn't meant it to be a real dig, one of the talents SI-5 had honed being an ability to compartmentalize and then joke mercilessly about their worst memories, their most sensitive issues. Kepler's lectured him on _timing_ but he's almost never truly affected by the accusations. This time, though, he sips his Arnold Palmer and brushes crumbs off his fingers, the plastic bag hooked on his elbow swinging with the movement. "And how _do_ I treat my tools," he says, voice smooth and soft, "Mr. Jacobi?" 

Jacobi's abruptly reminded of Kepler's favorite knife, carefully maintained, meticulously sharpened. It's scratched and a little worn, the textured steel grip battered, but it flips open with a smooth, clean flick of his thumb and he keeps it securely clipped to the inside of his back pocket, well within reach. He's replaced the blade, replaced the handle, the rivets, the hinge, switching out parts as they deteriorated or broke (which is fairly often, considering how much he puts it to use). 

Kepler had his favorite guns (always polished, regularly cleaned, rarely if ever abandoned in the field), his most comfortable belt/pocket/sling/leg/shoulder holsters (brown leather, all of them, and rotated like a well-trained Pokemon team), the other favorite knife (a KA-BAR he keeps tucked in his boot), many of which were lost when his quarters were ejected into deep space. Jacobi was, at the time, acutely aware that that was the reason for Kepler's anger even _beyond_ the Balvenie, even beyond Minkowski and Eiffel determined to push their luck. He's not a sentimental man, but losing a set of perfectly functional equipment had to have hurt.

"You don't treat your people like stuff, you just... treat your stuff like people?" Daniel makes a face. "That's what you're trying to say?"

"I'm saying," says Kepler, draining the last of his can and lobbing it into a nearby recycling bin, "that I take _care_ of what's useful to me." He steps past Jacobi to pull the door open, holding it until Daniel walks inside. 

Alvarez and Lovelace look up as they enter, bottles of room temperature beer in their hands. Alvarez immediately twists the top off two more, grinning as Kepler silently hands him the plastic bag. It contains two more beef patties, still warm, and a handful of napkins. "Luis's?" Alvarez asks, shifting to make space for Kepler to lean against the counter beside him. "I told you those were the best."

"Claro que sí," Kepler says, setting the small of his back to the edge of the counter and picking up a beer, his shoulder just barely brushing against Alvarez's. "And, it's the closest place open at this hour."

"Don't tell me," Lovelace sighs, exasperated, "he speaks Spanish too?"

"Be a shame if I spent six months in Argentina without picking some up."

Snorting, Alvarez bumps Kepler with his elbow. "And my mother wouldn't let him speak English in our house."

"'S how I picked up Russian, too." Warren taps the lip of his bottle against his teeth. "Max Dubrovsky was on the phone with his mom a _lot_."

"Why you always gotta eavesdrop?"

"I ain't been droppin' no eaves, honest," Kepler says, locking eyes with Jacobi just to make sure Daniel caught the reference, then winking in response to the exasperated shake of his head, "Max was _so_ loud."

"Yeah, _Dubrovsky's_ the loud one. Fuckin' liar."

"You callin' me a liar?"

"I think that statement," Alvarez says in a hilariously close approximation of Kepler's clipped cadence, "is _extraordinarily_ self-explanatory."

Lovelace and Jacobi extend their bottles at the same time, clinking them against Alvarez's while they snicker at the indignant look on Kepler's face.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> what r friends but the ppl who can clown u within an inch of ur life


	3. Chapter 3

Lovelace takes the bed that night, Jacobi the couch, and Kepler a camping cot borrowed from Alvarez, all decided by a few games of rock-paper-scissors. They turn in relatively late; Kepler's already gone by the time Lovelace rolls out of bed and subsequently wakes up Jacobi with her shuffling. The colonel doesn't show himself again until precisely 1100, poking his head in the door to invite them to lunch.

Alvarez introduces them to his wife (Maria), his mother (Carolina), an eight-year-old daughter and a cat in a small but neat apartment on the top floor. The team spends an hour in boisterous conversation with the family, consisting mostly of Lovelace being questioned by both Alvarez women and Will trading Kepler stories with Jacobi. Kepler's engrossed in a game of Miss Mary Mack with little Camila, cat purring between their knees as they sit cross-legged on an old carpet. They've apparently been at it all morning. 

He's uncharacteristically silent, letting Camila do the singing and indulging her whenever she sees fit to change up the rules. Jacobi knows that silence and the comfort it signifies-- Kepler's urge to fill up rooms with his own voice seems dormant in this company. 

"Met when we were kids," Alvarez says, "right about Camila's age. Don't know much about his parents, I don't think he saw 'em much."

"I can't even imagine the colonel as a kid," Jacobi admits. 

"Real quiet," Alvarez tells him, meeting Jacobi's disbelieving expression with a crooked grin of his own. In the light of day Daniel begrudgingly notes that it's just as jarringly handsome on his face as it is on Kepler's, but open and welcoming rather than the silent threat hidden under Kepler's smiles. "And _smart_. Didn't really push other kids around, but he had this way of making them do what he wanted. Scary, you know?"

Jacobi knows. 

"I recently realized," Kepler counters as he finally joins them, Camila clinging to his back, "that Will's smarter than me." He sets her down gently, ruffling her hair when she decides that she has no interest in the adult conversation and flits away to play with a haphazard pile of Legos. 

"Wow," Alvarez quips, giving the impression of someone who'd spent a lot of time rolling with a younger Kepler's harebrained schemes, "humility?"

"You know how to stay out of trouble. Not... a quality that's easy to come by."

"Warren Kepler learns to appreciate caution in his old age," Will says, laughing. He hooks his foot around the leg of a mismatched chair and pulls it out for him. "Someone call the Onion."

"They'd never believe you."

Lovelace moves for the kitchen when the other two women do, but Alvarez catches her by the shoulder and pulls her back down into her seat, pushing his chair back to stand up instead. "Hey," he says firmly, heading for the kitchen to join his wife and mother, "you're guests. Don't you _dare_ get up."

He makes no comment about Kepler, who ignores the chair and trails the family into the kitchen. 

"Okay," Jacobi says softly to Lovelace, "what. Is. Happening."

"Actually," she answers, "some things are starting to make sense." 

Lovelace doesn't get a chance to elaborate, making space on the table while Maria and Carolina lay out deep, steaming bowls of chicken soup cooked with generous helpings of rice. Kepler arrives with the last bowl, and Alvarez behind him with a handful of spoons. "Asopao de pollo," Maria tells them. "It's nothing special, but I think you'll like it."

"I haven't had this in _years_ ," Isabel answers, shifting her seat to make room for everyone else. She picks up a spoon and waits for Carolina to start eating before she digs in herself. Isabel makes all the appropriate declarations ( _Qué rico!_ as if she'd never left New York for some godforsaken space station eight lightyears away) and aggressively fends off any probing questions about whether or not she's in a relationship with Kepler. She unsuccessfully tries to catch his eye and manages to make contact with Will instead, meeting his exasperated smile with one of her own. 

Jacobi gingerly tastes the soup, hesitant to scald his tongue but eyes widening at the warm, rich complexity of its flavor. He's never considered himself fussy when it comes to food, but years of eating with Kepler had made him more discerning. The colonel's able to switch back to bland, lukewarm MREs with little complaint, but Jacobi can barely stand them now. He digs in with significantly more enthusiasm after a few seconds of letting it cool.

Warren, at once the most and least picky eater Jacobi has ever known, puts his head down and inhales his food. It's the first time he doesn't talk through a proper sit-down meal (salads at his desk while he sorts through paperwork are another story entirely) and Daniel notes the fond, nostalgic looks Carolina throws his way, her satisfaction at the sheer speed with which his soup disappears. He says nothing when he finishes, only picking up his empty bowl and heading into the kitchen to help himself to seconds. 

"Keep that up," Alvarez murmurs to Kepler when he sits down again, "they're gonna make you stay for dinner." He seems more accustomed to Kepler's silence than the gregarious chatter (and isn't _that_ a thought). 

Kepler doesn't reply, simply knocks his knee against Will's under the table and keeps on eating.

* * *

"You're awfully quiet," Lovelace comments to Kepler after lunch, all three of them loitering in front of the gym. She makes a point of noticing his silences, calling them out when he's been quiet a little too long. He assumes that she does it so as not to lose track of him when he's trying to be unobtrusive, or as a deliberate interruption in case of scheming.

"Not much to say," Warren answers, eyes flickering over the awning, his hands tucked in his pockets. All the talk, the stories, every misdirection he pulls out to obfuscate his humanity is absolutely useless now that Lovelace and Jacobi have seen him with an honest-to-God friend, someone who's known him since they were children. Someone who straight up slapped him on the back and announced to an entire room that he can _salsa_. There really isn't any going back from that. 

Giving him a skeptical look, Lovelace glances over her shoulder and folds her arms. "Yeah," she says, reluctant to share details, "look, I've got a stop to make." 

"I also have an appointment," Kepler answers, not probing for more. "We'll meet you in Brooklyn for dinner." 

"Okay." She doesn't comment on how Kepler knows she's headed to Brooklyn. "You want to hold onto the car?" 

"Yeah." 

Lovelace adjusts the jacket on her shoulders, extending a fist for both of them to bump. "Later, then." 

Not ten seconds after, Jacobi can barely pick her out of the city's landscape, the dark color of her clothes and her long, quick stride blending easily into the crowd. He's always liked the way the city can just swallow someone up, let him slip under the notice of strangers, but Lovelace wears that anonymity like a second skin as she descends into the nearest subway station. Daniel follows Kepler back into the gym, stopping at the counter with him.

"You're leaving?" asks Alvarez, clapping Jacobi on the shoulder and pulling Kepler into a rough hug, patting him hard on the back as he squeezes all the air out of his lungs. 

"Yeah," Kepler wheezes, struggling to free himself, "taking off." Before the Hephaestus mission, he might've been able to put up a fight; as it is, Warren suffers the indignity with grace. When he's finally released he straightens his jacket and slicks back his hair, like a parrot smoothing its ruffled feathers.

"Don't be a stranger, alright? We've missed you."

Kepler extends a folded slip of paper, lightly held between two fingers of his prosthetic hand. "If you need anything, this is how you reach me."

Rather than taking the slip, Alvarez catches his wrist and pushes it down. "You're going to ground," he says firmly, a sharp reprimand hinting at the kind of soldier a captain like Lovelace would know and respect, "I'm not gonna be the one to call you out. Get in touch when you're safe."

Kepler huffs, crumpling the paper in his fist as Alvarez lets go, and stuffs the scrap into his pocket. "Thank you," he says instead. He keeps his voice low, setting aside the expansive, aggressively bold tone he uses every other minute of his life. "For having us."

Daniel notes privately as they leave and pile into the car that it's _exactly_ the same voice he'd used in their last exchange on the Sol in orbit around Wolf 359, but this time it doesn't fill him with dread so much as an inexplicable calm. It's the second time he's ever heard Kepler sound like that; the second time he's heard it used in conversation with someone in whom the colonel's placed an absolute, unshakeable trust. 

That faith had meant everything to Daniel for six long years, then very little in the months after Maxwell was killed, the loss of it even a little thrilling once he kicked off his counter-coup. But when Cutter arrived with the crew of the Hermes, when it came out that Kepler had turned on Goddard at the very end, every time he emphasized that he didn't (couldn't) trust Jacobi anymore-- _The colonel doth protest too much,_ he thinks.

But even allowing Jacobi to see this much would've been unthinkable for him a year ago, and despite his insistence to the contrary, Warren Kepler never was a man who easily let go of things.

* * *

"You were gonna introduce him to Lovelace," Jacobi says, cranking his seat back so he can prop a foot up on the dashboard as they inch their way through Midtown, "but not to me?"

He hasn't forgotten that Kepler almost went on this roadtrip without him, would've let Lovelace see this side of him and not the man who'd acted as his shadow, his _administrative officer_ and _good right hand_. "Lovelace already knows him," Kepler says, matter-of-fact. "Besides, I was _planning_ to drop her off in Brooklyn while we independently handled our business."

Daniel privately concedes that that's just like Kepler. He kept his private life and his work life divided, a clean break between before-Goddard and after-Goddard, the man and the job, and never the twain shall meet. Jacobi shifts in his seat, leaning against the door, his temple pressed to the window. "It's just," he says softly, "that's why, huh? The reason you turned on Cutter?"

"What?"

"That family." Keeping his eyes gaze fixed out the window, Jacobi idly scans the overcast skyline. "You weren't gonna let Cutter kill them."

Kepler exhales. Unclenches his jaw. He knows Jacobi's history well enough. 

Spending time with the Alvarezes had always reminded Warren of how inadequate his own family was, though he likes to think that Jacobi's not one for jealousy or spite. Will's an indulgent father, just as warm now as he was when he was a child, befriending a boy so guarded and hostile that even the school bullies were afraid to cross him. A popular, athletic kid who decided Warren was _interesting_ enough to make a friend out of, and Kepler had done his best to make sure he didn't regret that decision more than he was satisfied with it, though he's sure that he has plenty of reason for both. 

"There were seven _billion_ lives at stake," Kepler says. 

"And if you had to pick," Jacobi asks, looking at him sideways, "between their lives and the other seven billion?"

Kepler's traveled all over the world. There are people in every corner of every country who don't deserve to die for Cutter's plans, and he knows many of them personally, has been on the receiving end of their hospitality. That was Cutter's mistake, in the end: assuming that Warren's big picture, his vision for the future, didn't include _people._ Despite his ability to coolly weigh lives against other lives, the thousands of strangers he passes in the street are just as human as the family that had practically taken him in. It would hurt, but the math is clear.

"I'd make the same choice." It barely seems to pain Kepler to say so, his mouth set in a resolute line. "Surely, Jacobi, a scientist like you can understand the enormity of that number?"

Jacobi internally berates himself for expecting some other answer, for expecting that anything in the world could outweigh whatever greater good Kepler might still believe in. "What if _I_ had to pick between you and seven billion?" he asks, and this time he's ready for the response. 

"Then I'd sure as hell hope you'd choose all of humanity over me." Not one to _hide_ when he's losing patience, the line between Kepler's brows deepens. "Why is this even a question?"

Not looking over, Jacobi crosses his arms over his chest and slouches into his seat. He weighs seven billion lives against one and the scale tips the wrong way, something deep inside him convinced that as long as Kepler was alright, everything else would turn out fine as well. They'd make sure of it. 

"I'm not sure I would," he says. 

Warren mulls that over, silently considering the possible motives for that kind of statement and deciding they'd both be better off if he didn't dig too deep. Jacobi's resolute stare into nothingness only helps that conclusion. "Then," he says carefully, "it's a good thing you weren't the one making that decision." After a beat: "What about between me and Maxwell?"

"Maxwell. No question." That can't come as a surprise to Kepler, and Daniel catches the flash of teeth in his periphery as the colonel grins. "If _you_ had to pick between me and Maxwell?" Jacobi asks. 

"I have confidence in my ability to facilitate survival for both of you."

"Cop-out," Jacobi grumbles.

"No faith in your own skills?"

"Just like you to make us do all the work." Wistfully: "Not even a question of who'd you'd pick between me and seven billion, right?"

Kepler gives him a look. Why ask questions he doesn't want the answer to? "The point of all this... is to make sure none of us ever have to make that decision."

"Again," says Jacobi. 

Flexing his fingers around the wheel, Kepler sighs. "Again."

* * *

Kepler's freakish ability to score parking even in midtown Manhattan lands them two blocks from their destination, and Jacobi eyes the floor-to-ceiling windows leading into a sparse showroom primarily stocked with women's clothing as they approach the store. "Valentino?" he says.

"I like the cut of their blazers." Kepler tells him, hands in his jacket pockets as he inspects a mannequin draped in a slinky black dress through the store window. "Makes back, hip and shoulder holsters more... discreet."

Jacobi squints at the back of his head. "I thought Goddard dressed you."

"Tactical gear, sure. Not everything I do is off the books." Kepler takes his hands out of his pockets and heads for the door, pausing outside of it to allow Jacobi to catch up before he pulls it open.

"Are you Darren Carver here?"

"Hawking. I was supposed to pick something up about a week after the Urania lifted off but didn't have the chance, since we had to fast-track construction." Jacobi trails him into the store, beelining to an armchair while Kepler approaches the counter, grinning at the woman who steps out from behind it. They exchange quick pecks on the cheek, and she makes a fuss over his prosthetic while Warren skillfully deflects her questions. He leads her over to Jacobi after an exchange of pleasantries, hand on the small of her back, and introduces her as Vittoria.

She's almost as tall as Kepler on four-inch heels, her hair in a sleek, dark bun, a mild Italian accent in her voice. Daniel knows instantly that he's stepped into a different world from the one he usually occupies, one where people are used to a certain amount of glamor and luxury he's never really been interested in. He'd stopped being surprised at how effortlessly Kepler slips into a new skin for every situation, but even he and Maxwell weren't privy to the colonel's solo non-SI5 assignments. 

Vittoria leads Kepler away once he's done introducing Jacobi (in rapid-fire Italian, no less), both of them heading into an office in the back. They emerge a few minutes later, Kepler disgruntled as he readjusts the jacket on his shoulders.

"You should allow us," Vittoria says, equally displeased, a plastic-draped three piece suit in her arms, "to take in the seams. We did not realize you would be like _this_ after so long."

"It's fine," he insists, no trace of his usual deliberate drag. He's talking in the same quick, no-nonsense accent as everyone else Jacobi's heard in this city.

"It is already tailored to accommodate a holster in the waistband," she says, and Jacobi's brows jump at the casual tone she takes in regard to a supposed lawyer being armed to the teeth, "and your shoulders, and your back, and your ankle... it will be much too big on you."

"I have other suits," Kepler reassures her, and they stop to stare each other down. "The bulletproof lining was the most important part," he says, reaching for the suit and plucking it out of her hands, "and it's done perfectly."

Vittoria frowns, deep red lipstick emphasizing her dissatisfaction. She puts her hands on Kepler's hips, squeezing, then flashing him an exaggerated pout when he just chuckles in response. "Look at this," she says. "It is a size smaller than it was."

"It'll come back," he says evenly. 

She lets him go with a huff, allowing Kepler to cajole her into a laugh after another minute of playing at anger. Finally, her hand on his elbow, she directs his attention back to Jacobi. "And your partner, if he ever needs a suit, you will refer him to me, yes?"

"Of course."

"And Marcus," she asks, "Mr. Cutter, how is he?"

Kepler's expression doesn't change even when Jacobi fixes a wide-eyed stare on him. "Busy," Warren says, looking appropriately saddened at the idea, "I haven't seen him in months, myself."

"Ah. Well, tell him I said hello when you do."

* * *

"You," Daniel says the moment he's back in the car, Kepler hanging his suit carefully in the cargo area, "bought suits with _Cutter_?!"

Kepler grins as he settles into the driver's seat and starts up the SUV. "What can I say, Jacobi, he liked my style."

"Who was that?"

"Vittoria Gianelli." Kepler glances over at Jacobi's expectant silence, briefly wrestles with how much information he actually plans to share about this aspect of his lifestyle, and sighs. "She started there the same time I transferred into the Goddard legal department. Had to have been fifteen years ago, and I've come to her for formalwear ever since."

Jacobi makes a face. He doesn't even have contacts from more than seven years ago. "Fifteen years?"

"Well, yeah. You form relationships with other professionals, and they'll do things for you they wouldn't for anyone else." Pointing at a storefront as they pass it, Kepler elaborates: "If I asked the clowns at Hugo Boss to measure me with multiple holsters on, they'd call the police. I can ask Vittoria to line a merino wool suit with proprietary Goddard bulletproof fabric, and she'd have it done for _free_. How do you think I'm gonna get you your supplies once we're set up?"

"That doesn't make sense."

"They work on commission," Kepler says matter-of-factly. "It makes perfect sense to maintain a lasting relationship with customers, who might then refer other customers. Customers such as Marcus Cutter, and Rachel Young, and even you, if you'd like."

"No way. I could buy five hundred burgers with the cost of just one of those pieces."

There's a moment where Jacobi's sure that Kepler's about to pull over and frog-march him back to the store to get him fitted for a proper suit, but the colonel takes a very long, very calming breath instead. "Well," he says, sounding pained, "if you ever change your mind."

"Sure. Where to next?"

"Have some things in storage. I put some suits away when I moved down to Florida, but they should fit better than the one we just picked up."

Moved down to Florida? Jacobi searches Kepler's profile, openly inspecting him as he drives. He'd already been working out of the Canaveral HQ by the time Jacobi started at Goddard. "How old were you?"

"Thirty-one. Right about when Cutter started having me do intelligence work." 

"And you were with Goddard even before then, right?"

"I've been involved with Goddard ever since they paid my way through the last year of high school."

It's been several months since Jacobi last read Kepler's file and he'd skipped over much of his early life for the juicier bits of the story. He knows that Goddard had scoped out Kepler since he was _young_ , but hearing it phrased like that, in a perfectly neutral tone, is enough to make something heavy and bitter settle in the pit of his stomach. "Jesus," Daniel mutters. 

"Some recruiter made the offer when I was getting deeper into ah, boosting and selling electronics." Kepler's got a mild, self-effacing smile on his face, the one that gives away absolutely nothing of what he's thinking. "Monitors, car parts, stuff like that. Back when screens were those big, boxy CRT things. Said they'd pay for undergrad if I could get in."

"And it worked?"

"Oh, yeah. Amazing how much easier it is to get good grades when you're not worried about _feeding_ yourself." He chuckles, like it's a funny memory, or at least a pleasant one. Goddard bankrolling his entire life, so long as they gained his loyalty in return, had been an easy trade to make at the time. "Alvarez and I went through USAF basic training together right out of school, I spent about a year in the force, then left. Will stayed. I went to undergrad, law school... you know the story. Goddard officially picked me up as soon as I passed the bar in Illinois."

"You've never worked for anyone else."

"Never saw the point. Cutter took... an interest in me about a year in, and every time I got bored he'd put me somewhere else." 

Jacobi has seen Kepler bored; it's not a pretty sight. He sits up, crossing his arms over the dashboard and propping his head on them to look sideways at the colonel. Other than ballistics, being unemployed is apparently an experience that of the two of them, only Jacobi's ever had. "Free agent life is new to you, then."

"Sure," Warren concedes, "but Goddard's all about progress, and it did a pretty good job of setting us up for success."

 _That_ hits a little close to home, and Jacobi's sure that he knows it. Kepler'd spent a lot of time setting him and Maxwell up... for... success. Following the example Goddard set for him. Funny how generosity and _maximizing efficiency_ so often went hand in hand, how easily one could be mistaken for the other; Warren was stingy with information, likely on orders from above, but he'd never kept them from something they needed to do their work.

Daniel sighs, sitting up straight again and pulling his arms back, fingers catching on the headrest to stretch his shoulders. Kepler's given him more in that last conversation than he has in a long time, and Jacobi's not really in the mood to push his luck. "How much time until we pick up Lovelace?"

"Couple hours." Kepler glances at the car's clock. "We can sightsee, if you want."

"You don't have any other plans?"

"No, we'll have hit all my stops by the time I've picked up my things. Would just be waiting on Lovelace for dinner." He points at a sign as they roll slowly past it, depressing the brake when a light ahead of them turns red. There's a taxi half-in and half-out of the lane, trying to cut in front of them. "We can go to the Met," Kepler suggests, knowing that Jacobi's following his gaze, "there's a new--"

"Ancient ballistics exhibit!"

"If that's something you might be interested in."

Jacobi's wide-eyed grin is the only answer he gets.


	4. Chapter 4

They pick Lovelace up at 1800 in Williamsburg, some distance away from where she'd probably actually been. She loads in two duffel bags of gear and crawls into the back. Where Minkowski and Eiffel might ask about her day, Jacobi and Kepler don't bother, which is just as well; despite how much they must already know about her, she's not in any mood to _confirm_ it for them. Kepler takes them to a nice restaurant in a trendy part of the neighborhood, case of beer in hand, and drops into the kitchen for a few minutes before he joins them at their table. 

After they order, the servers bring them complimentary wine to start, and several appetizers on the house. "Chef was my roommate in undergrad," Kepler explains at Lovelace's confused look, a smug grin back on his face after a rather long time without an opportunity to show off. "I'll introduce you later."

After they get their entrees, the servers bring out the _entire selection_ of desserts. Lovelace is wrapping up a story about some sort of near-miss she'd had in the Air Force with Alvarez, free wine prompting a bit more conversation than she might otherwise engage in, when a chocolate mousse lands on the table in front of her. Jacobi perks up at the appearance of a cheese platter, meeting Kepler's eyes long enough to catch an insolent little wink. 

"Or CO was thinking about having us court-martialed," Lovelace says around a mouthful of her mousse, "but he put us on the latrine crew for a month instead." She glances down, eyes widening minutely as the scent of rum and cherries hits her sinuses. 

"I read that report," Warren says, unable to suppress a laugh. He'd been impressed with Lovelace's audacity and quick thinking then, somewhat surprised at the familiar name included in the file, but anyone who'd contradict (shortsighted, erroneous) orders gained points in Kepler's book. Whether or not they were successful only changed his opinion a bit, the result of her insubordination hadn't been _abject_ failure, and someone who might have otherwise died was only severely injured instead. "I said Will knows how to stay out of trouble, but I'm starting to think he goes looking for it."

"Yeah, he's an enabler." Lovelace pushes her mousse toward the center of the table and motions for Kepler to switch it with his own wine-flavored sorbet, which he obligingly does. "But he doesn't throw people under the bus."

Jacobi spares them each exactly one piece of cheese before decisively hoarding the rest for himself, taking particular care to savor the gooey chunks of taleggio and soft gorgonzola dolce. "Oh," he says after a second, tapping the back of his hand against Kepler's shoulder, "tell her about Argentina."

Kepler stuffs a mini bombolone into his mouth, chewing slowly. "The time with you and Maxwell?" he asks after a few seconds.

"Nah, the first time." 

"Well, I was there to infiltrate the film industry! Went in thinking, I speak Spanish." Kepler brushes sugar off his fingers, voice dropping about half an octave, his words losing their careful enunciation and gaining a fluid, easy cadence. Where so much of his usual talk only implied absolute confidence, switching to Spanish puts it on clear display, everything from the set of his jaw to the tilt of his head. "Señora Alvarez dice que hablo como un _nativo_ de la República Dominicana. Easy, right?" 

"Oh no," Lovelace says, already laughing. She bites down on her spoon, a flash of teeth over stainless steel.

"Yeah, no one could understand me. 'Un chin, un chin, ¿qué es un chin? ¿Habla español, muchacho?' It felt like I was ten again," Kepler huffs. "Argentinians think they sound so good. They _don't._ " 

Still chuckling over the idea of someone calling _Kepler_ of all people a muchacho, Lovelace leans back in her seat and takes a second to review his words. "Did... something happen when you were ten?" 

"Nah." Looking up, Kepler briefly catches Jacobi's eye. "I don't think so, anyway." 

"You sound like a totally different person in Spanish," she observes. Not that she's surprised; everything she's seen in the last few months had indicated pretty clearly that he could give any chameleon a good run for its money.

"That's the nature of languages, isn't it?" Kepler saves a quarter of the mousse and passes the plate to Jacobi, then reaches for the slice of tiramisu still untouched in the center of the table. "So do you." 

"I don't hate it, but the instant machismo... bit of a turn-off." 

Jacobi gives her a bewildered look. "Turn- _off_?" 

Lovelace makes a gagging sound. 

"Anyway," Warren continues, "I brushed up a bit, started talking funny to blend in, and things were going great for about six months..."

* * *

They're halfway through New Jersey when Jacobi, somewhat tipsy, slaps the dashboard and sits bolt upright, eyes fixed on a glowing sign as they pass it. "A Sonic!" he practically shouts, then turns his eyes on Kepler, mildly unfocused but also _very_ determined. "Can we go?"

"You _just_ ate," Kepler says, incredulous. "You said you couldn't even move after dinner."

"Yeah," Jacobi whines, "but we haven't had trashy fast food in like, a _year_. Sometimes a guy's just sick of gourmet."

Lovelace considers that it's a _little_ mean of Kepler to be having this conversation with Jacobi while the latter isn't completely sober, because he puts on a hurt expression (which instantly prompts Jacobi's face to go blank in terror) and asks in a steely tone: "You have a complaint about my cooking?"

"You're a monster," Lovelace tells him, and she can see the mask crack for a second before he brings it back under control. 

Jacobi swallows, putting both hands up, palms out. "That's not what I meant," he says.

"I'm kidding," Kepler says after a moment, "we'll go. Want anything, Captain?"

"Chili cheese dog."

"I can't believe the two of you aren't full."

"Oh, no, I'm full." Isabel considers for a second that she might not be entirely sober either as she leans forward onto the console between the front seats. "I might throw up if I eat it. But I want one _so bad._ "

Kepler's laughing as he pulls into the drive-thru. He sticks his head out the window and rattles off a long list of menu items, and when he receives the order, it comes in two massive paper bags that he has to pass to Lovelace to keep in the back seat. He takes an order of chili cheese tater tots out for Jacobi, and indicates with his chin the bag containing Lovelace's hotdog. Two medium drinks is his only concession to how collectively bloated they still are. 

"That's way too much food," she says, gingerly arranging the dog so as not to spill chili on herself.

"It should be enough for the whole crew," Kepler answers as he merges back onto the highway. "Bet everyone's craving something fried and cheesy after all that time in space." He reaches over and blindly taps Jacobi on the arm, clearly not immune to the craving himself.

"That's... nice of you."

"Careful," Jacobi cautions, spearing a tater tot on a fork and delivering it straight into Kepler's open mouth, "that's how he gets ya."

Hell of a warning from the guy who's feeding Kepler tots, but Lovelace declines to comment. It's the job of the person in the passenger's seat to make sure the driver doesn't crash trying to eat something, after all, and it's dark enough outside that it would be safer for all of them if Kepler would concentrate on driving, gray clouds rolling forebodingly across the horizon. "I'm starting to think that might not be so bad," Isabel muses, lightly kicking the back of the driver's seat.

"Oh, for sure." Jacobi downs a forkful of tots. "Nicest guy in the world when he wants something from you."

Isabel decides that she is _definitely_ drunk, because she leans forward, propping her chin on the back of Kepler's seat, her cheek squished against the headrest, and she mumbles into his ear, "What're you after, Warren?"

He glances at the rearview mirror, meeting her eyes. "Just your cooperation, for now."

"Sure."

"And," he adds, more amused than annoyed, "for you to put your seatbelt back on."

* * *

They pull up to the house in Stroudsburg as the first drops of a storm hit the windshield, Jacobi and Lovelace springing out of their seats with their fast food and dashing for the door. Kepler takes his time, slinging one strap of his bag over his shoulder and grabbing Lovelace's duffels as well. He hands them off to her when she comes back out for them, and heads inside to leave his own stash with Maxwell.

It takes less than twenty minutes for the storm to reach full swing, rain and lightning lashing the windows. The island separating an open-concept kitchen from the living room is crowded, much of the crew gathered around it to eat standing up together rather than sitting down at the couch or at the little plastic dining table. Hera and Vic's shells are both set on the marble surface, the former bantering happily with the crew and the latter quietly observing, chiming in with the occasional beep or whistle.

"Wow," Eiffel comments as he polishes off an order of fries and goes back into the bag for a burger, "I missed this."

Hera's the only one who hears him, or at least registers the comment, and she cuts herself off to ask, "Missed? Do you remember having fries?"

"Oh." Considering her question, Eiffel slowly unwraps his burger. "Uh, not really? But I can sorta tell when something's a totally new experience, and when I'm going through something I've done before. Some things feel familiar, and some things don't. Like watching Star Wars versus Groundhog Day."

"That makes sense," says Maxwell, and she sweeps her fringe back, out of her eyes, holding it back with a butterfly clip she keeps in her pocket. "I hadn't considered that would be a factor in all this."

Jacobi looks at her. Having had two hours to sober up, he's alert now, if tired. "Alana?"

"This is _very_ interesting, actually, since it's unprecedented in terms of clinical study." She whips her tablet out of a pocket to take notes, clearing space on the table while Minkowski and Lovelace back off to give her room. "But if we visualize memories as impulses that form synaptical pathways through repetition, there's--"

"Dr. Maxwell," Kepler interrupts, his brows furrowed. 

There's a part of Alana that still bristles at this, the insistence that she simplify and reduce a concept from its clearest, most accurate description, to translate it into something others can understand. It had always chafed, although the insistence on complex jargon in academic circles was never to her liking, either. But years of working with the SI-5 had shown her the value of plain old utilitarianism, the benefit of doing whatever she has to to achieve an objective, including rephrasing things for a lay audience. "We can visualize memories like... well, a river and its tributaries."

"Oh," says Kepler.

Jacobi touches his elbow, craning his head to look at his face. "Sir, care to explain?"

Communicating with an audience not made up of specialists in her field forced Maxwell to condense her ideas, visualize them in a way that can (and has) changed her methods. It made her a better scientist, and Kepler, who had worked with enough scientists to know this, would do his best to meet her halfway. Not least because it made him look smart. "As I understand it," he says, a little nudge to help her formulate the analogy, "when you say memories are like a river, you mean they carve pathways in our brains?"

"Exactly!" Turning to Eiffel, Maxwell inhales deeply before she launches into an explanation. "Your memories might be gone, Eiffel, but the neural pathways in your brain that were formed when you first had these experiences are still there. Like a river that's dried up, but the path that it had carved into the landscape still exists. When you do something new, you can perceive that it's a new experience that's creating neural pathways of its own as it goes, but when you're repeating an experience that you've forgotten, it's like pouring water back into a container that's already been shaped."

Eiffel listens with a focus and intent that seemed completely absent before he was mind-wiped, eyes locked on Maxwell as she speaks. As much as the loss of his memories was a travesty, the Eiffel it revealed is attentive and resourceful, capable of rising to many occasions without the need for any arm-twisting. His traumatic memories of alcoholism, separation from his daughter and months in prison were only regained second-hand, memories that had chipped away so much of his confidence and drive that he could only mask it with sarcasm and pop culture references. 

Four months isn't enough to bring him up to the same level of physical fitness as the rest of the crew, but he'd earnestly done his best and Kepler can always appreciate that. "It's an imperfect metaphor," Warren comments, "since you don't regain anything, but the experience is taking up space that used to host the same kind of memory, so it seems to come easier." 

"So that's why communications makes sense to me the first time I see the documentation," Eiffel says, "even though it's all pretty much nonsense to a layperson?"

"Pretty much." Maxwell beams at him. "And why Dr. Pryce is already outclassing every other computer scientist on Earth. She's hard-wired to understand it, not just because she is who she is, but because those are well-worn neural pathways."

"What about AIs?"

"Same concept, Hera. If the directories are already there, even though everything in them is deleted, organizing new files should be much easier."

"Speaking of," Kepler says, hauling himself to his feet, "I'll be right back."

* * *

Kepler knocks twice before he toes open the slightly-ajar door to the room Pryce had claimed, a modestly-sized bedroom with a single twin-sized bed. "I was wondering where you were," he says, regarding the woman at the desk, one eye in her hand and a very small, flat-headed tool in the other. She doesn't seem to be doing maintenance so much as probing the components of the eye, and she closes a tiny panel on it when Warren pauses just inside the room. "Dr. Pryce."

She smiles and pops the eye back into her skull, a mechanical whir emanating from her head as her eye re-calibrates itself and then focuses on him. "No need to be so polite, Warren." 

"Can't break the habit," he says, approaching her desk to set Invictus's shell and an order of cheese fries on the desk. "And I thought you might like some company and cheese fries."

"Much appreciated. Hello, Invictus."

Vic beeps back at her, a cheerful greeting. 

Kepler leans back against the edge of the desk, arms crossing over his chest as she reaches for a fry. "Not gonna join the crew?"

"The atmosphere was so nice outside," Pryce demurs, "I didn't want to bring them all down."

"I think they're all aware that you don't have the memories or resources to pose a threat."

That prompts a soft laugh, Pryce shaking her head. "You have such a way with words," she says, voice dry. Then, after a pause (in which she eats another fry): "Rooms just seem to go quiet when I enter them, and I know Hera still isn't a fan. We've worked some things out, but she's understandably a bit... apprehensive in my presence."

Regarding her curiously, Kepler relaxes against the table behind him. "You don't think desensitization is the solution here?"

"Do you think desensitization is ever the solution?"

"How do you mean?"

"I've been reading the files you gave me." She indicates the stacks of paper on her desk, neatly organized. She'd agreed to not try and obtain a tablet, more for Hera, Minkowski and Lovelace's peace of mind than any belief that they could stop her if she actually put her mind to it. "The transcripts, the papers..."

"And?"

"It's hard to imagine the person I was." She knows that Kepler's heard the story, gleaning bits and pieces from scattered Black Archives annotations, so she doesn't bother with any background. Lacking the actual memories of helplessness, of being blind and dying, then mutual salvation in the form of Matthew Newman, the Miranda Pryce that had existed seems entirely foreign. "As I understand myself now, it doesn't seem like something that could ever make sense to me, but I know that at some point I was perfectly fine with... well, all of it."

"The company you keep tends to have more of an effect on you than any genetically determined impulse or childhood experience." Kepler tilts his head, a pensive look on his face. "I can't say that I haven't changed for the better, myself."

"In what way?"

"My priorities have shifted a bit since we were on the Hephaestus. What's your read on all of that?"

"It goes back for a very, very long time." Working her way through her cheese fries, Pryce chews slowly. Unlike Kepler, who draws out his words to decide his next statement, she chooses to ponder in silence, only speaking once she's decided exactly what she wants to express. "Dr. Maxwell says that she takes full responsibility for her actions before she was brought back, and that seemed to be a reasonable methodology. I think that there's no undoing the things I've already done, but I can try not to repeat my mistakes."

"You came to a conclusion that most people never manage to," Kepler tells her matter-of-factly. "What were you saying about desensitization?"

"Oh. Just that if things escalated slowly enough, in small enough and logical enough steps, I suppose it's possible I could've reached the conclusions that I did." On her last fry, Pryce scrapes it across the bottom of the little cardboard container, scooping as much cheese as she can in its ridges. "Desensitization was probably a contributor to that," she adds.

"You know, people say that if you put a live frog in a pot of boiling water, it'll jump out." Warren shifts his stance, both hands braced on the edge of the desk and shoulders just slightly lowered. "If you put it in a pot of cold water and turn up the heat slowly enough, it'll never have any idea at all that it's dying. I think some studies have disproved that in a practical sense but as a metaphor, it seems applicable."

"What kept _you_ from being boiled alive, Colonel?"

What kept him from leaping wholeheartedly into the abyss with Marcus Cutter?

"Maybe the knowledge that I was in a pot." He smiles, disarmingly sincere. Or at least, he's a good enough actor to give the impression of it. "I don't think you have to worry about becoming that person again, Dr. Pryce."

It's hard to show emotion with cybernetic eyes, but Pryce gives him an appreciative look all the same, calm and studied. "That's reassuring," she says. "Everyone tells me that you're an excellent judge of character."

"Then I hope you'll trust me when I say that we'd all like for you to join us for dinner." Kepler pushes himself upright, rolls his shoulders and straightens his back. "Invictus can stay with you, if you'd rather not."

 _Oh._ Never one for tact, before or after her hard reset, Pryce smiles at him. "That's a very thoughtful way of monitoring my activities," she says. "I'll consider it."

"Nothing gets past you, does it?"

"I've taken it as a compliment." Pryce folds her hands in her lap, meeting his eyes. "After all, not many things terrify the great Colonel Warren J. Kepler."

"'Terrify' is a _strong_ word."

"But is it an inaccurate one?"

"I think," Warren answers, walking backward toward the door and pausing with his hand on the knob, "'has a healthy respect for your abilities and potential' sounds a little better."

"Oh," says Pryce, dismissing him with a wave, "of course."


	5. Chapter 5

Pryce joins the rest of the crew in the living room after about ten minutes, just in time to see Kepler bump Jacobi on the shoulder and ask, "Duck thing? They know about the duck incident?" 

Both of them are perched on stools, leaning with their arms crossed over the marble countertop. Jacobi sighs, meeting the crooked smile on Kepler's face with a grimace of his own. He doesn't answer, silently pleading with the colonel to make everyone drop the subject. 

Miranda wonders briefly whether or not the duck thing is something she would have known before the mindwipe (the reset? the reformat? it's hard to reach a consensus on what to call it when the only other person who might give her feedback is trying desperately not to think about it). She joins Maxwell at the couch and puts Invictus on the table with Hera, gingerly settling in. Many of her joints are artificial but muscle memory, her body's genetic memory of its own age, isn't so easy to bypass.

"We knew about the duck thing," Minkowski volunteers, "but we didn't hear about any specific incident."

Kepler presses his lips into a thin line, carefully gauging Jacobi's expression. With a clear effort, he shakes his head and catches Minkowski's eye. "It's not as interesting as it sounds," he says, putting his fist to his mouth. "Forget it."

Years of working next to Kepler, waiting and watching for his signal, make it obvious to Jacobi the kind of restless energy he has to suppress when he's forced into inaction. He'd apologized once over showing the entire office a certain video and he hadn't done it again after being ignored for a week (to the extent that Jacobi could ignore his superior officer). Daniel tries not to be touched at his restraint and fails utterly at mustering the cool detachment that used to come so easily. With Goddard in the picture, it was simple enough to imagine that everything Kepler did that resembled kindness was part of the job, just another way to keep his right hand loyal. 

But now? 

"You might as well show them the video," Jacobi sighs, burying his face in his elbows.

"You sure?"

"Maxwell hasn't seen it either," he mumbles back.

"You never showed Maxwell?"

"Just get it over with."

"This is my favorite video of all time," Warren says, taking out his phone as the rest of the crew drifts to the island and gathers around him. He sounds fervently sincere, a laugh undergirding his voice as he pulls up the file. It must be on the cloud somewhere, because he's _supposed_ to have a new phone, and it's crazy to think that Kepler's still hooked up to his private server. Considering his other contingencies, he must have an encrypted backup of it somewhere, and it _really_ shouldn't surprise Jacobi as much as it does to learn that he has a copy of the duck video on it.

Daniel picks his face out of his arms eventually, when the quacking of ducks is drowned out by the sound of furious, frightened yelling. He knows they've reached the part of the video where he ducked behind Kepler, using his CO as a human shield, because Lovelace stifles a laugh at Warren's alarmed, incredulous 'Jacobi?!' and Daniel has never, in all their years together, forgotten that tone of genuine confusion in Kepler's voice. It's the only time he's ever heard it. 

The rest of the crew's reactions range from pure sadistic glee (Maxwell and Lovelace) to affectionate sympathy (Minkowski and Eiffel). 

"Is that me?" Daniel groans. "That's what I sound like? No way is that me."

"No," says Maxwell, shoulders shaking with barely-suppressed laughter, "Jacobi, that's your voice." 

"Thanks," he deadpans. "I hate it." 

"I like it." Kepler's voice prompts Jacobi to swing his head around, wincing with the movement as all the wine from dinner decides to remind him that he'd forgotten to stay properly, non-alcoholically hydrated. "Very distinctive," Kepler adds, tucking the phone back into his pocket and slipping off his chair.

Lovelace tracks him as he sweeps a set of keys off the counter. "Going somewhere?"

"Left a few things in the car."

Maxwell watches him leave, his head ducked against the wall of rain outside, then turns her gaze back on Jacobi. "So what happened in New York?" she asks, taking Kepler's vacated spot and leaning on his shoulder. 

"A lot, actually. I'll give you a play-by-play later. What's been going on back here?"

"Maxwell got Hera and Vic up and running... honestly, that's about it." Minkowski smiles, simultaneously sheepish and relieved. No one had actually enforced shift changes on the Sol and Urania, but something about hurtling through space in a glorified tin can had been enough motivation for both crews to rotate as scheduled. "We've been sleeping for most of the last two days. Only got up to throw food in the microwave or toaster oven. I haven't felt this rested in a long time."

"Hot Pockets and Pizza Bites are officially great," Eiffel adds, grinning. 

Motioning at the nearly empty bag of lukewarm burgers and fries still sitting on the counter, Minkowski asks Jacobi, "You're not hungry?"

"We had dinner in the city," he says. 

"How was it?"

"It was _really_ good," Lovelace tells them, and she ignores the kick Maxwell delivers to Jacobi's shin under the table. Alana pulls up the calendar on her phone, turning it in her hand to show Jacobi the highlighted date, and nudges him again, fixing a pointed stare on him while Daniel lapses into a moody silence. "High-end Italian place," Lovelace continues. "I'll take you guys the next time we have a chance, the chef seems like a good guy."

"You met the chef?" asks Minkowski.

"Another one of Kepler's contacts."

Eiffel raises his hand, waiting for Lovelace to acknowledge him before he asks, "How many people does that guy know?"

"I don't know, but I hope he introduces us to his interior designer sometime." Minkowski raises both hands, palms forward, at a skeptical look from Lovelace. "Have you _seen_ the bathroom?"

"I wasn't really paying attention," admits Lovelace. She hadn't had much time to explore the house before taking off again with Jacobi and Kepler, so when Minkowski motions for her to follow, she obligingly trails the other woman into the bathroom. Strains of their conversation carry over, Lovelace remarking on the tile and layout, the obscenely expensive rainfall showerhead set into the ceiling. And that's just the guest bathroom.

"How'd dinner measure up against Kepler's cooking?" Eiffel asks after a moment, addressing Jacobi directly. He'd learned over the last few months that a brooding Jacobi usually means an imminent explosion if he's not distracted from it soon, and that the easiest distraction usually just means 'somehow involving Kepler'. "I mean, everyone says he's good, but my only other frame of reference is those MREs and they're uh, notoriously bad."

Maxwell exchanges a look with Jacobi, equal parts wry and amused. "It was better," Daniel says, "but not by much. Just 'cause the colonel doesn't do dessert."

"Wish he would, though," sighs Maxwell.

"You could just learn to bake," Eiffel points out. 

Jacobi barks a laugh. "Very funny."

* * *

It takes Daniel nearly half an hour to register that Kepler hasn't come back from the car, then another five minutes of trying to convince himself that he doesn't care before he excuses himself from the conversation with Maxwell and Eiffel to go and check. He _shouldn't_ care if Kepler's gone-- wouldn't put it past him, and there's another car in the garage and Uber if they can't start it, they're not in _space_ anymore and options abound for a resourceful operative. He still can't help the sigh of relief when he sees the SUV still parked on the street, cargo door flipped open and running lights blurry behind heavy sheets of rain.

Jacobi takes the distance at a run, ducking under the rear door, out of the rain, and stepping gingerly over the stream of water rushing along the curb. They'd stowed the rear seats to make room for cargo and Kepler lies on his back in a cleared space. He has his arms crossed behind his head, legs bent at the knees, damp jacket spread out over the surface of a cardboard box full of his clothes. Marvin Gaye streams softly from the car's speakers and Jacobi takes a moment to wipe rivulets of water off his own face. Barely four seconds in the rain and he's already drenched.

Kepler doesn't acknowledge him until Daniel clambers into the cargo bay with him, shifting a few boxes to make room to sit. His weight jostles the car's carriage enough to prompt Kepler to crack open one eye. 

"You okay?" Daniel asks, folding his legs under him. "Warren?"

Sitting up, Kepler fights back a yawn. "That," he says slowly, "is a pretty big tell, Jacobi."

Jacobi snorts. As if Kepler isn't just as obvious about it himself, so who's he to point out the way Daniel switches to his first name when he's worried? "What're you still doing out here?" he asks, ignoring the comment. "It's freezing."

"I didn't want to go back inside just yet."

The SUV's interior lights cast a soft, diffuse glow, nearly invisible from a distance with the storm all around them. Kepler's still damp, though he'd had some time to dry off, shirt sticking to his torso and hair falling into his eyes where it isn't slicked back with rainwater. "You're wet," Daniel says, "sir."

Warren shifts his back to rest against one of his boxes, making space for Jacobi to scoot over. "Been a while since I got rained on," he says cheerfully.

Jacobi joins him, folding his legs as he sits. Kepler doesn't have to say that he didn't imagine he'd ever have the chance to be caught in the rain again, that both of them had been positive at various times on the Hephaestus that they'd never make it back to Earth. Jacobi can understand the impulse, but he didn't see so many clothes in Kepler's closet that he can afford to let a whole set get soaked through just because it might feel nice in the moment. 

"What are you doing out here?" Kepler asks, finally, lightly bumping Jacobi on the shoulder. 

"You know what day it is?" Daniel says, knowing that Kepler will play dumb, will be _difficult_ about it and force him to say it, if one of them absolutely _must_ acknowledge the day. 

"Friday." He manages to draw the word out, deliberately obtuse. 

Daniel groans. "It's the twenty-fifth," he says, struggling out of his hoodie before the dampness can spread to the soft gray tee he has on underneath. He uses it to wipe his face, his neck, then tosses it to land on another box nearby.

"Is there something significant about the twenty-fifth, Mr. Jacobi?"

"You remembered our anniversary."

Kepler huffs, a smile twitching up the corner of his lips. "The timing wasn't ideal." 

"Dinner was really good," Jacobi tells him, pulling a knee up to his chest and wrapping his arms around them. "Both of 'em."

"I would've brought Maxwell," Warren says, "but she wanted to get Hera and Invictus set up before anything else."

"I figured."

"You oughta head back inside," Kepler adds after another few seconds, both awkward in the silence and reluctant to break it. "Get some dry clothes on."

"Why'd you do it?" Daniel frowns at Kepler's questioning look. "Today." 

He leaves the other questions unasked, the _After everything I said to you? Everything I did to you? Like what you've done for me isn't enough already?_

Months of Kepler looping him into the Plan, of indulging him and Maxwell, simultaneously keeping them at arm's length yet closer than ever-- Daniel's not so naive that he thinks anything will be the way it was again. Kepler had told them exactly what _he_ planned to do, what he and Lovelace had agreed on, and hadn't even suggested that Jacobi would be involved beyond what he'd already promised to Minkowski and Daniel hadn't offered. The idea of life untethered from Goddard is too tempting to relinquish just yet, but Daniel would be lying if he said he didn't miss the certainty of Kepler's command. 

Warren sighs, so quiet it's nearly drowned out by the rain and looking too tired for himself. "I wasn't planning it, Jacobi. Things worked out. Enjoy it while it lasts."

"I'm surprised you didn't take off the moment everyone settled in here, honestly."

Kepler pushes his hair back from his forehead, frowning when a few stubborn strands flop back down. "'Well,'" he says, "'I must endure the presence of a few caterpillars if I wish to become acquainted with the butterflies.'"

"Did you just quote something that isn't Shakespeare?" Daniel physically turns his body to stare at him, incredulous. "Was that from 'The Little Prince'?"

"It's a classic," says Warren, mildly defensive. "I _do_ read other things."

"It's the antithesis to your _entire_ shtick."

"What! How so?"

"Isn't it all about 'seeing with your heart'?" Jacobi flashes him a skewed smile. "Far be it for me to accuse you of having one--"

Kepler raises his brows. "Have we finally found a book that both of us have read?"

Daniel snickers, instantly recalling the memory of Kepler trying to make it through Mackey's _Unitary group representations in physics, probability, and number theory_ on Maxwell's recommendation, alternately finding ways to avoid reading it and bored to tears trying to parse it. There was a copy on the Urania, still dog-eared at page 106 (which isn't bad at all, for someone without an advanced physics background). Warren usually blazed through the most tedious of books and reports and essays with a speed that more than proved his law background, but he couldn't make it through that one. Unfortunate that those were the books Daniel and Maxwell preferred: solid chains of logic unhindered by narrative or conflict.

"I found a copy on the Sol," Jacobi says.

"Cutter's?"

"It was a 1943 original edition, so I'm guessing, yeah."

"I saw that in the manifest." Kepler hadn't been surprised at it; Goddard-Wright was, after all, an aeronautics company first and foremost and Cutter had been around almost since its inception. He _would_ be drawn to the whimsical narrative, themes of seeing beyond what's right in front of him. "Didn't realize you had it."

"Left it on the ship," Jacobi says flatly. "You want it, you're hiking back for it yourself."

"You know, I picked up a copy at some library sale when I was eight, a bilingual version with the words on one side of the page in English and Chinese on the other." Kepler keeps his eyes fixed on some distant point, not meeting Daniel's. "I memorized it," he says, "and I'd bet the other kids at school a couple cents I could read Chinese, and they'd make me 'translate' with the English side covered. Just enough to get a bag of chips at the gas station after school, but it wasn't nothing."

"You were hustling people as an eight-year-old," Jacobi deadpans. 

"Nine, by then. It helped when I took Chinese to fulfill a language requirement in undergrad." Considering the frequency of their missions in and around Asia, the language choice was also deliberate, a hard nudge from the Goddard handler who'd suggested that he round out his languages with fluency in the primary language of a then-rising economic superpower. "Did you like it?"

"Never really thought of things that way," Jacobi mutters, shivering a little as a gust of wind sweeps through the car, bringing a splash of rain with it. "'What makes the desert beautiful, is that somewhere it hides a well.' Y'know, like, what makes a bomb beautiful, is that somewhere it hides an explosion?" 

Kepler disguises a laugh as a cough into his fist, leaning away from the cheeky nudge Jacobi delivers to his ribs before pulling the younger man under his arm. 

Jacobi eyes his hoodie, the open cargo door, and considers the heat radiating off Kepler. After a moment he shuffles closer, fitting his neck into the crook of Kepler's elbow as it bends and he lets his arm drop, prosthetic hand held in a loose fist, knuckles resting lightly on Daniel's chest. "What about you?" Jacobi asks.

"'If someone loves a flower, of which just one single blossom grows in all the millions and millions of stars, it's enough to make him happy just to look at the stars.'" It's a little ironic, Warren considers, that between the two of them, Jacobi's the one without a romantic bone in his body despite his insistence on remembering significant days. All he wanted was for Warren to remember them too; He never liked the ritual, the trappings, the poetry of it, and the look he turns on Kepler is at once confused and hopeful. "'He can say to himself: Somewhere, my flower is there...'" 

"Showoff," Daniel grumbles, "I don't memorize entire _passages._ "

"But if the sheep eats the flower, in one moment all his stars will be darkened.'" Warren, for his part, has never half-assed a thing in his life and if he's going to remember an anniversary, he's sure as hell going to celebrate it. He very pointedly doesn't react when Jacobi shifts again, weight resting more heavily against his ribs, cheek nestled against his shoulder. "Looks like the rain is letting up," he says instead.

Neither of them move or speak for several minutes, Daniel silently stewing over his words while Kepler drums the fingers of his organic hand against his own bent knee, tapping along to the beat of Got To Give It Up. He could probably fall asleep to the sound of music overlaid with the rain outside, and before Jacobi had come to find him, he nearly had.

Then, finally: "What the hell is that supposed to mean, anyway?"

"It's just a passage from a children's book," Warren deflects. "If you think _that_ means something, try reading some literature for adults."

"You wouldn't have all that memorized if it didn't mean something," Jacobi points out.

Kepler would be the first to acknowledge (at least to himself) that any semblance of eloquence on his part is really a patchwork of outside influences stitched together like Frankenstein's monster, if a rather successful one. Bits and pieces he'd picked up and integrated for the job, becoming whatever he needed to be to complete the objective. He never was one for composition, but he recognized a pretty turn of phrase when he heard one. "The metaphor loses something if I have to explain it," he says after a few seconds. 

"Try me."

"Earth is the rose, Marcus Cutter is the sheep." Kepler smirks. "Sometimes you gotta break a few sheep to make lambchops?"

Daniel rolls his eyes. The omelet metaphor was always stupid, and Kepler'd managed to make it even more ridiculous. He didn't survive this long in the SI-5 by being oblivious, though. "You got homesick?" he asks, trying to sneak at look at Kepler's expression and getting only an eyeful of his ear, the angle of his jaw. 

"A lot of things made me sick up there," Kepler answers, trying to sound flippant. 

The words strike Jacobi as being uncharacteristically sincere, at odds with the tone if only to avoid the impression of naked honesty, but then he always did like to hide his uncertainty, his genuine affection, anything that isn't anger or terrifying competence behind a wall of smug arrogance. "You and me both," Daniel tells him, and he can feel Kepler laugh, the hitch from deep in his chest. 

Warren turns his head and Daniel's instantly struck by the thought that their faces are too close, Kepler's too warm, his arm too heavy. He was always tactile, easy touches to Daniel's arms and shoulders whenever he wanted attention, cheerful slaps on his back after particularly impressive demolitions, but Kepler'd only recently allowed Jacobi this deep into his personal space. They haven't talked about that kiss from months ago and neither have bothered to clarify or elaborate on it so Jacobi had just let it be, but he'd be lying if he said he hasn't _thought_ about it nearly every single day since.

Kepler must be thinking about it too, because he starts to pull away, expression instantly guarded. "Daniel--"

Jacobi sits up first, extricating himself from under Warren's arm. "Let's get this stuff inside," he says, shuffling forward on his knees and reaching for the boxes. He's no stranger to rejection but right now, right here, he doesn't want to hear it. Daniel's got his arms around one box already when Kepler's hand closes around his wrist and pulls him back, gently turning him so they can face each other. 

He hadn't intended for it to sound like _I give up_ but maybe it's what he'd meant, and maybe it's what Kepler had heard. The colonel had assumed once that Jacobi's tolerance for being jerked around was endless, but no one could say that Warren Kepler ever made the same mistake twice.

"When this is all over," Kepler says, voice soft, "we can think about it." 

"Right now feels like a pretty good time," Jacobi whispers back, and he means it. Holed up in the back of an SUV with the rain pouring outside and Marvin Gaye crooning _I Want You_ softly in the background seems pretty ideal to him. (Did Kepler have his entire discography or something?) 

"I can't afford distractions right now, Daniel."

'Job now, talk later' has always been Kepler's response to distractions in the field. No room for attachment, panic, jealousy, grief, shock-- he'd put it all away and then he might or might not come back to it later when imminent death wasn't quite so close at hand. Jacobi considers that maybe he should be flattered that he even qualifies as a distraction when he'd kind of assumed that he was just a non-issue at best, but he huffs and looks away, refusing to meet Kepler's eyes. "You don't think it's more distracting to have to dance around each other like this?" 

"Am I distracting you, Mr. Jacobi?" 

"Oh," Daniel spits, "like you don't know."

Kepler releases him, hand flexing as he sits back again and regards Jacobi with a thoughtful look on his face. 

"Okay," he says, finally. "Come here."

"I-- what?" Daniel shakes his head. Did he hear that correctly? "Okay?"

His hesitation drags on a moment too long and Kepler reaches into a cupholder under the window for the SUV's key fob, hitting a button to close the cargo door. He leans forward just enough to snag Jacobi by the front of his shirt and drag him closer, unceremoniously arranging him back-to-chest in the space between his knees. "Don't," Kepler hisses into his ear, arms looping around his waist, "make me repeat myself, Daniel."

Daniel stops breathing for a full five seconds, stops moving, tries not to startle and maybe accidentally jar himself out of this hallucination. "Sir?" he asks when he feels the warm press of lips to his nape, fingers curling into the material of his shirt.

"I don't," says Kepler, excruciatingly slowly into the back of Jacobi's neck, "have the time or resources to devote to a relationship right now." A long exhale, soft and hot on Daniel's skin. "And I won't ask you to wait indefinitely. That wouldn't... be _fair_. So I'm asking: what do you want?" 

"What uh," Jacobi says, wondering whether the heart jackhammering against his ribs is Kepler's or his own (he suspects it's both), "what resources, exactly, are we talking here?"

"I'm not," Kepler murmurs, "about to start anything while we're living with seven other people."

Daniel can't resist. "Aw," he says, a bite to the words even as he feels Kepler tense up behind him, "you wanted to wait until we've got a cottage with a white picket fence all to ourselves first?" 

"Well," says Warren, without missing a beat, "I imagined we'd have the kids with us." 

"The kids," Daniel repeats, momentarily thrown.

"I didn't tell you? Well, about four years ago, I picked up a very special--" 

"Oh, my god." Daniel sags backwards, and he doesn't just _imagine_ Kepler's arms tightening around him or the laugh muffled into his shoulder. "Just say Maxwell and Vic." 

"That's happening soon. Getting out of each other's way is priority." Business-as-usual voice takes on a distinctly thoughtful tone. "But with everything else that's going on, there won't be much time to get all my ducks in a row..." 

Daniel makes a disgusted sound. 

"... so to speak... especially in regards to a hypothetical 'us'."

Daniel mulls that over, trying to work out the _point_ behind giving him all this context and losing track of his thoughts entirely when Kepler shifts to settle him more comfortably against his chest. But the colonel's being patient (for a given value of patience), not rushing him into any kind of choice, though admittedly just sitting like this drastically compromises his decision-making ability. "I'm not looking to get _romanced_ here," Daniel says after a moment. He idly catches Warren's hand and turns it palm-up to inspect old calluses, comparing them to his own. "It's not all on you to carry whatever this is, and it's not like there's ever a right time to jump into it." 

"I'd appreciate if you didn't project your lack of time management skills on me," Kepler says primly. 

"I'm just saying." Daniel tilts his face up to press a kiss to the soft spot under Kepler's ear, right along the edge of his jaw. "This," he breathes, grinning at the quiet hum reverberating through Kepler's chest and into his own, "I like this. Sitting here? And talking, and you not playing Hide the Sausage with the truth. That's what I want. Can we do more of that?" 

Kepler takes a second to consider it, gaze distant, and he finally meets Daniel's eyes with a serious, brooding look on his face. "I think we can, Mr. Jacobi." 

Feeling as though they'd just signed some sort of contract, Daniel sighs. The nice part is that Kepler takes contracts seriously, that if they've decided on the terms, he'll hold to them. The worst part is how he manages to make even the most personal kind of conversation into business. "God," Daniel gripes, "everything's a negotiation with you, isn't it?" 

"What, you miss taking my orders?" 

"Kinda miss complaining about 'em," Daniel murmurs against Kepler's throat. He's warm all over, wrapped up in Warren's arms and his smell and the dark, crooked little smile on his face. There's something familiar about that expression, the clinical way he maps out Jacobi's reactions, and no one in the world should find that _reassuring_ , but Daniel does. 

"Just... trying to reach an equitable solution for both of us," Warren says, and then it clicks.

Jacobi's sat in on more than a few of Kepler's interrogations, but when it came down to business Daniel could never muster the stomach to do it himself. It hadn't been any use, anyway; Kepler tailored his approach to every subject with a meticulous attention to detail that vividly demonstrated why Cutter's faith in his ability wasn't misplaced. Someone less acquainted with them might come to the conclusion that Kepler's a sadist, but sadists primarily torture to satisfy themselves and Kepler had never placed his own pleasure ahead of the mission objective.

Not to say that he didn't _enjoy_ interrogations in and of themselves. Kepler treated them like a mystery, a puzzle to be solved. How to extract information that was a. True and b. Useful? People will admit to anything if they're scared enough, and Kepler made a game out of finding that sweet spot between pain and truth. Jacobi had one time watched him shrug on a white labcoat and snap on a pair of latex gloves in the observation room. 'Iatrophobia,' he'd said, grinning. 'Fear of doctors. _Fun!_ '

That mark had broken in a record four minutes and eighteen seconds. Daniel wonders if he should be proud that he held out for six years.

Sitting up, he turns in place, still straddled between Kepler's legs. Warren's cybernetic right hand curls around the back of his neck, the organic left firm on his hip, dragging him closer, so Daniel shuts his eyes and closes the last bit of distance between their lips. He sinks into the solid warmth of Warren's chest as they kiss, slow and lazy, like they've got all the time in the world.


	6. Chapter 6

They head back inside eventually. Jacobi trails Kepler, both of them with a box in their arms as they stroll past the congregation in the living room. Kepler stops to chat for a minute, briefing Minkowski's crew on his plans for the rest of the week (which include three consecutive days of rack time starting immediately), and then he finally joins Jacobi in their room.

Daniel waits for Kepler to shut the door behind him before he drags his crumpled t-shirt out of his hoodie's front pouch-pocket and flings it at him, scowling. "Couldn't wait _ten minutes_ to get back inside," he complains, shrugging out of his pullover and indignantly showing Kepler the livid little marks left on his collar. He'd only been distantly aware of what Kepler was doing in the back of the SUV, but there's no hiding _that_ from Maxwell. Possessive bastard.

"I didn't hear you complaining earlier," Warren retorts, but there's an admiring glint in his eye as he takes in his handiwork. "Actually, I distinctly remember you saying--"

"So frickin' _impatient,_ " Daniel mumbles, cutting him off. He openly watches Kepler strip out of his shirt and wring it dry, dripping water onto the hardwood and then lobbing both his and Jacobi's shirts into the laundry basket. "You talk so big about playing the long game."

"Oh," says Kepler, feigning confusion, wide-eyed and wounded, "does that mean you _don't_ want to join me in the shower?" 

_Unbelievable_ , Jacobi thinks. He'd always known that Kepler has a mischievous streak a mile wide, but that was largely overshadowed by his being a stubborn, micromanaging asshole. "No," he says meekly while Warren's look of piteous distress instantly becomes a devious grin, "I'm coming."

* * *

Discretion is something Daniel had picked up in the SI-5-- that, and the kind of preparedness they don't impose on independent contractors for the US government. Most soldiers sleep in less clothes than Kepler often required of his team, the colonel insisting that they be able to roll out of bed and out the door able to melt into a crowd. Time to change wasn't a luxury that they could always afford. Jacobi regularly went to bed naked or in just his boxers before joining Goddard, but after, he'd have trouble even getting to sleep without a minimum amount of clothing on. Maybe it's the knowledge that more than once, that precaution had saved his life.

He notes with some dismay that Kepler hasn't lost that habit either, sliding under the covers of the bed already dressed in his t-shirt and sweats while Jacobi pulls on a tank top and cinches the ties on the basketball shorts he'd dug out of the back of Kepler's closet. "I gotta ask," Daniel says, flicking the room lights off and clambering in after, "what the hell did you mean by 'don't have the time or resources to _devote_ to a relationship'?"

"I meant that if I'm gonna maintain a relationship," Kepler answers, shuffling to one side of the bed to make room and turning on the bedside lamp instead, "there are certain things that I expect to do--"

" _Such as_?"

"Dates, gifts, vacations... I didn't get to take you and Maxwell to Machu Picchu when we were in Peru, or to see the deer in Nara, or the Amazon in Brazil, or the Louvre in Paris..."

Daniel silently mourns the loss of bare skin as he squeezes in close, taking every inch of space that Kepler sees fit to give him and draping himself partly over the other man, one arm thrown across his chest and a leg fitting itself comfortably between Warren's knees. "I wasn't looking for that," he mumbles, burying his face into Warren's neck and sleepily nosing at his skin. "We were on the job."

"I know," Kepler huffs, "but I wanted to. I saw them my first go-round, and it was a great experience."

"You've been thinking about it since Peru?"

"Just that it would've been nice if we'd gone."

Daniel takes a minute to imagine the scenario in which they had enough time to hit all the tourist spots, which admittedly takes very little work. Kepler had taken them to numerous other landmarks over the years, insisting that they absorb the culture if they were going to be in places with so much history attached. It had struck Jacobi as oddly sentimental then, but later he'd realize that Kepler just loved to see the work of masters. Not enough single-minded obsession to be an artisan himself, he'd say.

Daniel folds his arms across Warren's chest, propping his chin on them. "How many relationships have you been in? Serious ones?"

Kepler quirks a brow at the question, but he doesn't push Jacobi off. "Two," he says.

"Who were they?"

"Well, one was Maria Alvarez, formerly Herrera."

 _That_ prompts Daniel to sit up on his own, frowning. "Your best friend married your girl?"

"It's a funny story, actually." Folding his arms behind his head, Kepler grins. "We had Business Law together in sophomore year of undergrad, and I overheard her telling her friend that she thought I was cute, so I asked her out after class. She thought it was funny that I could speak Spanish, and we were together for about a year. By then we both knew we were better off as friends, and she had a thing for Will. I mean, who wouldn't, right? So we broke up and she went after him-- you ever see Cielo y Infierno? That telenovela?"

"You know I haven't."

"Well, it was embellished a _lot_ , but the first plot was loosely based on what happened between the three of us--"

" _No_ \--"

"Yeah, the writer was our drummer, so she was on the periphery of all that watching it go down." Kepler laughs softly, eyes sliding shut. He hadn't seemed very close to Mrs. Alvarez, but it doesn't surprise Daniel that they'd drifted apart. "It wasn't quite as messy as they made it out to be, but good communication doesn't make for good television. Gave us a cut of the royalties, but I let Will have my share when the show finally aired. They were engaged by then, so it seemed easier than finding them a gift."

"Your life sounds like a bad sitcom sometimes," Jacobi tells him. "Who was the other one?"

"Just a... regular, long-term relationship." There's a low hum in Kepler's chest when Jacobi shuffles closer and brushes his fingers through his hair, skimming across the soft line of his fade and into the still-damp, sideswept fringe falling into his eyes. It's a nice departure from his crisp, pre-Hephaestus taper and the early-days crew cut, flattering in the diffuse bedside lighting. "We were together two and a half years before Goddard ate up _all_ my time, and we broke it off because... I could make the occasional big gesture, but you can only last-minute cancel on someone so many times before they work out that they're playing second fiddle to your job. I didn't bother getting into anything serious after that," Kepler adds softly, "but when it's good, it's _really_ good."

"You think Cutter had something to do with it?"

"I know he did. My workload decreased almost immediately." 

"Girlfriend?"

"Yeah." Warren's voice is distant. "We were talking marriage, but it never got as far as a proposal."

Daniel squashes a flash of-- discontent? Envy? It's too muddled and he's too tired to really work out whether he doesn't like the idea of Kepler having gotten that deep into a relationship with someone else, or if he doesn't like that he'd even had the _option_. "Huh. Never clocked you for a straight guy."

"Really."

Admittedly, Kepler did a bang-up job of looking and acting the part of every straight-laced military man from Daniel's childhood. He hadn't indicated much interest in men _or_ women, even treating honeypot assignments like it was a rote procedure. Still. "You pretty much just confirmed that you thought your straight best friend was hot," Daniel says, "and y'know, every gay kid in the world can relate."

That prompts a laugh. "Am I wrong?"

"He's a solid nine-point-five. Why do all your contacts look like models?" 

Warren smirks. He cracks open one eye and unfolds his arms, pulling Daniel back down on top of him, hands clasped at the small of his back. "Birds of a feather, I guess."

"And you were way too comfortable hitting on me in that bar," Daniel murmurs, settling in. 

"You remember the political climate when we were younger," Kepler says. "Didn't see a point to pursuing anything serious with other men at the time."

Daniel had never bothered with restraint in his life, politics be damned, but he makes an understanding sound anyway. Kepler played the long game. If he didn't see potential in something, he wouldn't bother with it. "What were they like?" Daniel asks. "Your exes." 

"Oh, you know. Smart, funny, and kind. Better than I deserved." Kepler couldn't give a more canned answer if he tried. "I'm pretty good at picking 'em, though. What about you?"

"Like you don't know."

"Humor me."

"I don't think I've ever had anything that lasted more than a few months. Way more than two, though. You remember Calvin. And Klein."

"I still can't believe--"

"If you start making Calvin Klein jokes again, I swear to god--"

"Calvin was... his last name? You should never trust a guy with a first name for a last name."

"Yeah, Paul." Jacobi can't help snickering at that, the prejudice just as nonsensical as Kepler's aversion to professional bowlers. "Paul Calvin." 

"I hated that guy," Warren comments. "You were off your game for weeks after the breakup." 

"Well, some people don't just stop at _being_ miserable, they have to make everyone else feel like shit, too." Daniel grins, basking in the thought of Warren being angry on his behalf. He'd noticed Kepler treating him more gently just after that split and bounced back much quicker for it, especially considering it was the first one he'd gotten into after being employed again. 

"I wasn't about to tell you who to date, but--"

"Yeah, yeah. You never liked him."

"Didn't he ignore you for a week?"

"And wouldn't tell me why when I asked, yeah." After a moment of contemplative silence, Daniel fixes a look on him. "How did you know about that? Maxwell wasn't around yet."

No conversations to eavesdrop on, and Daniel hadn't exactly kept his CO posted on his personal life. 

"You were compulsively checking your phone and never actually replying to or receiving any messages. It drove me crazy."

"Yeah, well, imagine what I was going through." Jacobi'd spent so much time afterwards with a team that preferred to have it out over a problem on the spot (or within minutes of mission conclusion) rather than let resentment fester, and for all the messed up weirdness of the job, he hadn't ever felt as off-kilter with the SI-5 as he had in that relationship. "I liked Klein more," he muses, "but it didn't mess me up half as bad when we split. We both wanted to make sure the other was okay. He was a good guy." 

"I'm surprised you only had two while we worked together," Kepler says, yawning. He blinks sleepily up at Daniel, the thumb of his prosthetic idly hitching up the hem of his shirt and drawing slow, lazy circles on his hip. "Always thought you were the kinda guy who likes being with someone." 

"Honestly, same deal as you." Daniel squirms out of Kepler's grasp to lay on his side when the colonel's breathing grows slightly more labored from the weight pressing down on his chest. "SI-5 took up all my time," he says, shoving one arm under a pillow and ducking his head to kiss the ball of Warren's shoulder, "and you know how we were. I didn't feel like I needed anything more than that while we were all together. Was that intentional?"

"Having a life outside of Goddard wasn't an option for us, so I made sure we had one within the company. That was intentional."

"It wasn't a bad life."

"No. You miss it?"

"Yeah. I'd probably... make mostly the same choices if we could do it all over again." Daniel smiles when Kepler turns onto his side to regard him with an expression that's far too fond for the face delivering it. He reaches up to trace the contours of Warren's cheek, dragging a finger along the line of his jaw. "Were you low-key romancing us the whole time?" he whispers.

Kepler's brows furrow. "No?"

"I mean," Daniel says slowly, "you'd take us out all the time, drag us to parties, we've watched a couple movies together, I think I saw you tuck Maxwell in one time? But I was pretty hopped up on painkillers, and I think you were, too." 

"We were on the clock," Warren answers, amused, "those parties were _mandatory_ , we were surveilling a target, and it was below freezing. I didn't want the scientist I spent six months and several hundred personal hours recruiting to die of hypothermia."

"You're good at rationalizing irrational behavior," Jacobi points out.

"It doesn't seem irrational to keep my AI specialist alive and my right hand happy."

"Yeah, because you rationalized it. That's... kinda cute."

Kepler breathes a frustrated sigh, and he catches Daniel's chin with his left hand, tilting his head to catch and hold his gaze. "I don't want you thinking," he says, low and serious, "there was more than there was. I did what I thought would keep the team running smoothly. Whatever sentiment existed wasn't romantic, and if you start thinking it was, your judgement will be _compromised_."

"Compromised?"

"If you have wrong information, you'll draw the wrong conclusions." Letting him go, Warren props himself up on one elbow and plucks Daniel's hand away from where it had settled on his shoulder, holding it tightly. "I've kept context from you before, and I don't want you to get hurt because of it again."

"So give me context."

"There was no chance of anything happening between us while we were both with Goddard. I would've stopped you before it got that far."

 _Just a taste_ , Kepler had said when he recruited Maxwell. You only get the slightest whiff of possibility. He had (perhaps unintentionally) given Daniel a lot of tastes over the years, moments of care that hinted at a deep, intuitive sense of obligation. It was maddening to know that Warren could be gentle and kind, that he could read people like open books and charm and spoil them exactly the way they wanted, but he only ever did it to further the interests of _Goddard Futuristics_. 

"Sniper check?" Daniel asks. 

"Cutter didn't want me distracted. He didn't want my loyalties split, or my focus to be somewhere other than the _big picture_. Getting involved with each other would've been a liability for both of us."

"Oh. It would've been... a commitment." And Kepler, for all his talk about how everything is whiskey and therefore expendable, _commits_. To decisions, to teams, to the company; he might take some time to make the choice, but once he does, it's always full steam ahead. Just like now, with Jacobi, and whatever he's planning with Lovelace. "You'd be all in," Daniel says. 

"I haven't done this... in a _very_ long time."

"Is that what's happening here?" Daniel supposes that for all the confidence Kepler usually imparts by staying calm and playing at control even when things were spiralling wildly out of it, he appreciates the honesty. "Why're you giving me context _now_?" he murmurs, wiggling his fingers as they start to lose circulation in Warren's grip.

"Because," Kepler answers, pressing a kiss to his knuckles before he lets go and pulls Jacobi under him, "I don't make decisions for you anymore."

* * *

Maxwell had noted the lights in SI-5's room going out uncharacteristically early, especially for two insomniacs like Jacobi and Kepler, but Lovelace and Hera had a few suggestions about rigging the house despite Kepler's initial prediction that it was only a temporary stop, and Vic had some questions about the internet (which she's reluctant to answer, given... the internet), and before she's even really aware of how much time has passed, Lovelace and Minkowski are turning in. Eiffel had gone to bed hours ago, Pryce retired to her room, and she tiptoes up to the door, listening for a second before cracking it open and slipping inside.

Kepler stirs immediately, extricating himself from the jumble of limbs thrown over him with a care and ease that leaves Jacobi totally undisturbed, Maxwell standing awkwardly in the doorway with her tablet clutched to her chest and Invictus in her hand.

"Do you mind if I keep working?" she whispers, watching Kepler sit up and pull the hem of his shirt back down, then dropping her tablet by her pillow. "Congrats, by the way."

He looks wide awake, as if he hadn't slept at all, and he catches Vic's shell when she tosses it to him, setting him on the bedside table. "Have you rested at all since we left yesterday?" he asks.

"A bit. It's just been more interesting to work with Vic and Hera. Dr. Pryce has been helping out too."

That nets her a curious look. "The crew finally calmed down enough to let her onto a tablet?" Then, more admonishingly to himself: "I should've checked in sooner."

"No," Maxwell hurriedly tells him, "but she watches me code and makes suggestions. She's really good."

"I see." He stands up, padding toward his closet and then the bathroom with Maxwell on his heels. Voice still low, so soft she'd have trouble understanding him if he weren't so mindful of her ability to lip-read, he asks, "Has Minkowski been giving you any trouble?"

"They pretty much just leave me alone," Maxwell says, accepting the clothes he presses into her hands before he shuts them both into the bathroom and he faces the door. She changes quickly out of the already mildly chili-stained clothes she'd borrowed the day before, then moves for the sink to brush her teeth. 

"Anything else?"

"Everything's nominal," she answers, back to an almost normal volume and spraying toothpaste lather in little droplets onto his bathroom mirror. She sees him turn in the reflection, arms crossing over his chest as he leans back against the towel rack. "I'm making good progress beefing up the encryption on your personal server and laying the groundwork of a new AI mainframe for Vic and Hera. The software's coming along."

"You just need the physical components now."

"Yes."

"They'll be waiting for us at the next location." That point sufficiently addressed, Kepler tosses a quick look over his shoulder to indicate the rest of the crew, adding, "I still think we should disengage with Pryce and Eiffel and let them gather their bearings without all of us in the picture. They seem to be settling in well here. Minkowski too."

"You just want them out of the way so you don't have to babysit." 

"Proximity to us also puts them in Goddard's line of fire," he points out. "Crazy how one move can be beneficial to so many different factions, right?"

He doesn't sound particularly distracted, but Maxwell idly takes in Kepler's tousled hair, a hickey at the base of his neck half-obscured under the collar of his shirt, and gives him a skeptical look before she tosses back a mouthful of water and gargles. After spitting, she wipes her mouth and starts running the faucet for hot water. Kepler's not quite watching her, his eyes focused somewhere far beyond the bathroom mirror, but he registers her studying him and quirks his brow in a silent question. 

"Are you still good to do this," Maxwell says, "sir?"

"What are you actually concerned about, Maxwell?"

"If you want to take some time to focus on you and Daniel," she tells him, "it's not going to be a problem for me."

Alana knows that isn't quite true the moment she says it, and his skeptical look confirms it. They've had a lot more time together in the last few months (and especially in the first few weeks of their revival), the majority of it spent in relative quiet while they worked on their individual projects. Even with her difficulties regarding _human interaction_ , she can see the outcome, the inevitable third-wheeling once her two partners officialize a relationship with each other.

Kepler and Jacobi have been circling each other for years, their inside jokes giving way to ones shared between all three core members of the SI-5 and Kepler's indulgent moods encompassing requests from Maxwell too, but whatever secret inner circle of Kepler's confidence Daniel had wormed his way into is still out of reach for her, four years down the line. Jacobi doesn't get pulled aside to have his duties reiterated to him, and Kepler never questions his ability when he volunteers for a task. He still second-guessed her calls and demanded clarification when Daniel would only ever receive a simple 'do it, Mr. Jacobi'.

The colonel looks at her, calculating, no doubt fully aware of her misgivings. "No," he says after several seconds, "that won't be necessary."

"What if that's what he wants?"

"He knows what he's getting into." Warren pretends not to see her relax while she scrubs her face. "We'll have plenty of time for that after."

Trying not to be prematurely relieved, Alana frowns. She wrings out her washcloth and replaces it on its rack, turning to face him. "He won't wait forever." She _hopes_ Daniel isn't that far gone, anyway, but he's a grown man. He can take care of himself. "I'm not an expert on this, but you don't have to aim for perfection to make time for him." 

Kepler's gaze sharpens, steely and cool. He tilts his head curiously, curls the corner of his lip to bare a sliver of teeth. "That's why you've never gotten involved with anyone, right?" 

"I just want him to be happy," Alana says evenly. "People don't need perfect to be happy."

"You do. I do."

"You think Daniel's perfect?"

Kepler blinks, taken aback. "I-- what?"

"You just said, we need perfect to be happy." It's a little unfair; Maxwell is _fine_ with imperfection. She couldn't be a programmer if she weren't alright with trial and error, constant debugging, endless updates. But she knows how to fix software and work around glitches. She knows how to bring computers _closer_ to perfection. Her willingness to deal with the messiness of coding is a direct result of understanding it, and she'd never risk her happiness and comfort on something so incomprehensible as a human being. "You wouldn't get into something with him unless you were happy to, ergo..."

Kepler mulls that over and seems to reach the same conclusion. He'd never seriously try to code something; the poor computer wouldn't survive. But people? He _likes_ people. He likes (using) the weird, senseless, irrational human impulses, even if he doesn't experience much of them himself and even if he'd prefer that they weren't exhibited by his team. If he likes Jacobi, it's because of all the people in the world, he thinks he might understand that _one_. "Expecting perfection out of someone isn't doing them a favor," he says slowly.

"Oh?" Maxwell says, just a little bit mocking. "Because I seem to remember you having a certain standard for our work--"

"Which wasn't _perfection_ ," Warren interrupts, meeting her smirk with one of his own, "because perfection is unattainable, but we can still strive for it." 

Realizing that she's mirroring Kepler's exact expression, Maxwell pretends to clear her throat. "Have you been reading self-help books?" she teases, muffling an indignant sound when he flicks a towel into her face.

"I expect _better_ ," he says firmly. "I expect constant improvement, and learning from our _mistakes_."

Alana twists the towel in her hands, watching Kepler open the door again and step out, ready to head back to bed. "Wow," she quips, "then you're in luck. We're all really good at that."

"Yeah," he answers, a sly, knowing grin on his face. "I know."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> not that anyone's obligated 2 see it my way, but if yr wondering how i'm picturing kepler, it's [this](https://pbs.twimg.com/media/D8wH7YfXkAAk-bf.jpg) [guy](https://pbs.twimg.com/media/D8wH7YkWsAUXeJs.jpg)


	7. Chapter 7

It takes Warren about two full seconds to register that Jacobi's 'Wakey wakey, sleepyheads!' is coming from _behind_ him rather than from the man whose back he's plastered himself to, and the full-body flinch against his chest is more than enough to kick his already overactive paranoia into gear. He pulls one arm from under Daniel's head and rolls over for the pistol wedged between the mattress and bedside table, flicking off the safety as he sits up and cocks the gun.

When his eyes focus, they land on... absolutely no one. The cheery orange light from Invictus's shell flickers, and when he says, "Is everything okay, Colonel?" in Jacobi's voice, Kepler finally breathes again. 

"Invictus?" he asks, just to be sure.

"That's me!"

"Oh," Daniel groans, sitting up, "you've gotta be kidding me." 

He doesn't say anything else when Kepler gestures for him to stop talking, just lets his forehead thump against the colonel's back, inhaling and exhaling in time to the steady rhythm of Kepler's breath in lieu of hyperventilating on his own. 

There's a moment where Warren has no idea what to say, so he stalls by flicking the safety of his pistol back on and replacing it. "You scared us," he says after a few seconds, "Vic."

Invictus seems to register the tension in his voice and his light apologetically dims. "Sorry, sir," he answers, sounding contrite. He has a handle on every last inflection of Jacobi's voice, probably the rest of the crew's as well. "I was thinking about it all night," Vic says, sounding more confident when Kepler picks him up and brings him to eye level, "and I finally decided on this voice."

"You don't want to figure one out for yourself?" asks Kepler, keeping his tone light. He doesn't react to Jacobi's sigh into his shoulder blade, the hand twisting into the material of his shirt. "People tend to have unique voices, so you should find one you like. Or make one."

"You said," Invictus explains, "that you liked Officer Jacobi's."

 _Oh_. Kepler smiles, indulgent and fond. He cups his hand over his mouth and leans forward, as if whispering a secret. "You know which voice I like even more than Jacobi's, Vic?"

"Which one?"

"Mine."

Jacobi snorts, his weight relaxing against Warren's back while the light on Invictus's shell flickers again. After a moment: "Like this?"

"Just like that," Kepler tells him. "But you should find a voice that _you_ like."

"I like your voice."

"I think more and more, you'll learn which one you want to speak with." Setting Vic back on the nightstand, Kepler yawns but doesn't take his hand away. He'd hoped to spend the morning lazing around in bed with Jacobi, his first opportunity to do any lazing in several years, but a shock like this one first thing in the morning has pretty thoroughly dashed that hope on the rocks. "In the meantime," he says cheerfully, "there's a lot I could do with a voice double." 

Unable to float in Earth gravity, Invictus just shifts in place, a few tiny internal fans whirring. "What would you do with a voice double?"

"Pranks, mostly." Warren had woken up when Maxwell did, watching her collect her tablet, her keyboard from the desk, and leave the room with a cheeky wave at him. He finds a switch on the shell, lightly thumbing it without flipping it. "Why don't you let Dr. Maxwell know about this new development?" he suggests. "I'm gonna turn off your shell for a while."

Back at full brightness, Invictus gives him a cheery "Copy that!" and powers down. 

Kepler flips the switch anyway, just in case, and turns around to face Jacobi. "Stay with me," he says, watching his face, "Daniel."

"I'm okay," Jacobi says, frowning when Kepler flashes him a skeptical look and takes his hand, shifting his grip so the pads of his index and middle fingers rest discreetly on the inside of his wrist. "No, really," he says, knowing that Kepler's checking his pulse and dissatisfied with the answer, "I am-- it's just-- for like, a minute there--"

"I know," Warren says softly, reeling him in by the arm.

Daniel squeezes his eyes shut but obligingly shuffles forward, following Kepler as he leans back against the headboard. He tucks his face into the crook of Kepler's neck and shoulder, leaning into him. "Remembering everything that went on up there after that happened--"

"I know."

"That was a lot." He'd insisted he was fine, but Jacobi can tell that his breathing is still shallow and fast, that Warren doesn't believe him. That one's on him, really-- he'd told Kepler once that the alien doppelganger encounter wasn't going to be an issue and it had turned out to be a massive issue right up until being mind-controlled by Pryce became an even bigger one. "I still can't believe we made it out alive."

Daniel idly wonders how that meeting would've turned out had Kepler been in command on the module, if he'd have made things better or worse. Worse, for sure, by letting Xeroxcobi on board (as he'd eviscerated Lovelace for failing to do). Better, in many ways, by not allowing _any_ Jacobi to be torn apart in a radioactive flare and letting Daniel Prime _hear_ it. He would've known what was going on and handled it. He might've seen how badly Daniel had reacted to it and adjusted. 

He knows now, though. Kepler curls one solid arm around his shoulder and pulls him close, hardening his voice and his grip on Jacobi's arm. "We're out of it," he says. "Stay with me."

Against all common sense, that brings Daniel slamming back into the present. It's Kepler's _We have a job to do_ voice. His _Time to compartmentalize_ voice. The one that makes everything but his directive irrelevant. 

"I'm here," Daniel sounds off, turning his head to meet Warren's gaze with a sharpness and clarity that had escaped him for months. In fairness, Kepler hadn't seen fit to use that particular tone on him in all that time, taking care to back off the role of 'Commanding Officer' and fit into a slot that looked more like 'Partner' and 'Friend' and occasionally, 'Hassled Soccer Mom'. 

"You alright?" Warren asks, noting the change and rolling with it. "I need you with me, Mr. Jacobi." 

"I am," Daniel says, flashing a smile when Kepler ducks his head and plants a quick kiss on his temple, "but imagine what Vic's gonna do to you if he ever starts feeling underappreciated."

 _Imagine if_ another _one of your trusted, deadly, incredibly well-trained operatives decides to turn on you at a crucial moment._ "I'm sure I can handle it," Kepler says, shifting to prop himself on one elbow and drag Jacobi down with him, fitting his chest to Daniel's back again. He busies himself hiking up the hem of Daniel's shirt, prosthetic hand roving gently up his side to fit cool, silicone-textured fingers along his ribs. 

"You might want to talk to Maxwell," Jacobi says, but he doesn't insist, turning to pull Kepler down into a kiss. He settles in with Warren's lips on his neck, the warm, heavy weight of him like an anchor in his chest. Part of him wishes he'd had this on the Hephaestus, the same level of attention and care holding him down when his world was in chaos; the rest of him wonders if it wouldn't have drowned him instead.

* * *

Maxwell cracks up when Daniel relays his morning to her, slumped over the marble countertop. "Oh, my god," she says, burying her face in her hands. Invictus had informed her earlier that morning that Kepler had suggested using his voice, and she'd ranted briefly about his ego to Hera (who's always happy to complain about Kepler), but she hadn't expected him to do it for Jacobi's sake. It's almost cute.

Jacobi scowls at her over his plate of toast and eggs. He pitches his volume lower, just enough to be unintelligible to anyone outside of a very small radius around them. "This isn't funny, Maxwell!" 

"No, it _really_ is."

"It kinda sounds like Invictus has-- what, a crush on Kepler?" He looks over his shoulder toward the couch, trying to catch the colonel's eye, but Kepler's amusing himself teaching Vic slang from the '80s. The AI's shell is perched on his knee, cheerfully repeating phrases in a heavy South Side accent. It's nearly unrecognizable from Kepler's painfully standard newscaster English, but not incongruous with his voice; Daniel can hear traces of it when Kepler stumbles over certain words. It doesn't seem to bother him when it happens, but he doesn't ever trip up on the same word more than once. "Is that what's happening?"

Maxwell peeks at him through her fingers, finally straightening up to sit properly. "I wouldn't rule it out," she says. "Anyone who starts out on his team probably would at some point."

"Wait," Jacobi hisses as he processes her words, his eyes widening in horror, " _you_?!" 

She shushes him immediately. "It was really confusing, okay?" Alana exhales, glancing briefly at Kepler before she looks at Jacobi again. "But when someone believes in you like that, and they give you everything you ever wanted... that feels pretty special. It made me wonder if I was missing out on something."

"Oh."

"I mean, I concluded eventually that I wasn't."

"That's pretty normal," Daniel tells her, resting his cheek on the heel of his palm, grinning. For all Maxwell's genius, she has some pretty big gaps in her knowledge that she only occasionally discusses with Jacobi. Unfortunately for Alana, she seems to only have questions that universally stump most people anyway. "Plenty of single people think about being in a relationship," Jacobi points out, "and married people fantasize about being single. We spend a lot of time with each other and I wasn't an option, so... I'm kinda surprised you don't get that way with your AIs."

"No," Maxwell says, making a face at him, "the ones I design are like... my kids? They're such brats. I could never."

"You and Hera are pretty close."

"I'd hate to lose her, but I don't really know if that's supposed to mean anything." She adds, "There were professors I had braincrushes on, but that's... also different." 

"Braincrushes," Daniel scoffs, rolling his eyes. He heads for the fridge, Maxwell on his heels, and opens it to regard its contents. "Just say 'hot for teacher' like the rest of us."

Maxwell snorts.

"Look," he continues, unscrewing the cap from a half-full bottle of orange juice and nudging the fridge door shut with his foot. He looks at Kepler to make sure he isn't watching before he downs half of the remaining juice and bumps Alana on the shoulder with his own. "If you meet someone and you end up liking them enough, you should go for it. If you don't, don't worry about it. I'm always gonna have your back."

"What's it like, though?" Maxwell motions for him to hand over the orange juice and drains the rest of it, casting around the kitchen for a few seconds before she tracks down the recycling bin and dunks the bottle in. Gesturing toward the living room with her head, she looks at Jacobi again. "You and..."

"Good," Daniel answers, expression softening, "it's good." He laughs, quiet, but just skimming the edge of hysterical. "It's like stepping off a cliff." 

Alana wrinkles her nose. "How is that good?" 

"Well, sometimes dating someone's like walking through a booby-trapped house, Home Alone style." The relationship with Kepler, ironically, seems to contain less risk than many others Daniel's had. He already knows how Warren lives, how he works, knows him at his worst and his best. The plain knowledge that their lifestyle itself is fraught means that at least his connection to Kepler is a certainty. "This one is just-- you know. Simple."

"I'll take your word for it," Maxwell sighs, and she pulls him toward the living room to join Kepler around the table.

"We're heading down to Canaveral in two days," Kepler tells them the moment they sit, Maxwell across from him and Jacobi beside. "If you have anything to bring bigger than the standard, let Invictus know and he'll put it on the list."

"If I need more information than what you give me," the AI pipes up, still in Kepler's voice, "I'll ask!"

Daniel hides a grin behind his hand, simultaneously endeared and exasperated at the reappearance of The List. He'd glimpsed it a few times, back when Kepler was still neurotic enough to be doing it by hand, before he trained an AI to calculate space and weight requirements for him, then tally up the cost of replacing supplies. Invictus is clearly already well-versed in List Management, and Kepler catches Jacobi's eye with a questioning look before Daniel bumps him with his shoulder. "Nothing beyond the standard," he says. He didn't bring anything that would require more space than an average-sized duffel bag.

"Same here," Maxwell tells them. "I didn't bring much off the Sol, but if I think of something I'll let Vic know."

"Great." Kepler fishes his phone out of his pocket and leans back on the couch, sending a message to the groupchat informing everyone currently not present that the team will be be driving down to Florida soon and to inform Invictus if they wanted to bring something larger than a gym bag.

Maxwell glances at the message. "Have you spoken to Minkowski yet?" she asks.

"They'll be back in about ten minutes," he says. "I don't think I'll have to."

She gives him a skeptical look but moves on. "Also, I'm wiring this place up for Hera tomorrow," If Alana were alone with Jacobi, she would've already strong-armed him into a promise to help. Kepler doesn't always mind her lack of _finesse_ , but he doesn't respond well to demands. "It'll take most of the day," she adds. 

Jacobi looks at her, both of them familiar with the process. "Need a hand?" 

"Please and thank you."

"I'm free as well," Kepler offers, and Maxwell congratulates herself on correctly reading his plans. He'd cleared his schedule to rest and presumably spend some downtime with his team, and if spending time with Jacobi means helping them rig the house for an AI, then so be it. For all his machinating and shortcutting and streamlining, Kepler hates expending more energy than necessary. But he hates subpar work even more, which means that he exhibits the kind of mindset every AI developer hopes to instill in their work. No wonder Invictus took after him. 

Maxwell grins. "I'd appreciate your help, Colonel."

"Anytime, Dr. Maxwell." Setting Vic's shell back on the table, he glances between them. "Now how do you two feel about lunch? There's a bistro down the street I've had my eye on."

"We're not gonna get a chance to explore this town," Jacobi says, "so I'm in."

"Me too. I kind of want soup."

* * *

They return to Minkowski, Lovelace, Eiffel and Pryce gathered in the living room with an assortment of trinkets and toiletries spread out across the table from their morning trip into town. Maxwell makes a beeline for the refrigerator to stow their leftovers while Jacobi perches on the arm of Lovelace's armchair to scope out their haul. "I was wondering where you three were," Minkowski says in greeting, and she gestures for Kepler to join them, a motion he declines with a polite wave. 

"Something happen?" Jacobi asks, smirking when he catches sight of a bulk package of toothpaste and a bag of cool ranch Doritos. Lovelace catches him looking and hands over the chips with a roll of her eyes. 

Looking at Kepler, who's paused by the door to take his boots off, Minkowski stands up. "I wanted to talk to you, actually."

"You want to move this to the kitchen?" he asks.

"No, it's not that important." She seems to regret the words as soon as she says them, looking around the room when she's suddenly acutely aware of how many sets of eyes are fixed on her. Minkowski, being Minkowski, plows ahead. "It's just-- you mentioned that you guys are moving out to Florida soon. And Captain Lovelace is going with you?"

Kepler wanders out of the living room anyway, making his way to a cabinet for a packet of expired instant coffee and a mug. He sighs at the date on the coffee, but tears it open anyway and dumps its contents into his mug. Maxwell slides another mug at him, accompanied by a cheeky smile, and he pulls open a drawer for a little teabag (also expired) for her. "I was under the impression," he says when Minkowski trails him in, filling a kettle he digs out of the oven with water from the tap, "that you would too."

"I'm staying here. With Eiffel and Pryce."

Maxwell gives him a look as she leaves, mouthing _Seriously?_ , but Kepler ignores her. Just because he isn't doing it to jerk them around and bend them to his plans this time around doesn't mean Warren's going to studdenly _stop_ trying to predict the next move. "Understood." 

"If you need anything from me, I'll be in contact." Watching Kepler putter around the kitchen isn't a new sight anymore, but Minkowski internally, begrudgingly acknowledges that after so many months, she'll miss it. Mostly because it usually meant that a meal was forthcoming, but he's been teaching Eiffel how to cook ( _really_ cook, digging into Cutter's various stashes to introduce him to food he didn't have a chance to eat even before going to space), so her concern isn't just food, as much as she'd like to think that it is. "I still want to do what I can," she tells him, "I just don't feel like Doug and Miranda would be safe here by themselves."

"I'd say," Kepler replies matter-of-factly, crossing his arms over his chest as he waits for his water to boil, "you deserve a bit of a break as well."

Minkowski is... tired. She's so tired. She spent three and a half years in space, every second of it prepared for something to go horribly wrong and then having that paranoia immediately justified. Four months of relative peace on the Urania had allowed her to take her foot off the gas pedal, to take pressure off her adrenal gland, so to speak, but reaching a place that's honest-to-God _safe_ feels like someone slamming on the brakes. "That's not what this is about," she says, "but yeah. Some downtime would be nice."

"My offer still stands, you know." Kepler glances over his shoulder to check on the kettle, then back to Minkowski. "About putting you in touch with your husband. We could... _arrange_ things so that you can meet privately with him and work it out. An annulment isn't unheard of so soon after marriage."

"That's thoughtful of you," Renée deadpans, "but I've had some time to consider it and I think I'd like to keep him out of this mess. We've both had three years to move on." More sincerely, she puts her hands on her hips and meets his gaze, a flicker of gratitude in her warm, dark eyes. "Dominik doesn't... he's not the kind of person who moves on easily or jumps into things without thinking. I don't want to put him through that again."

Contrary to the first time they had this conversation, she's firm in the decision. "If you've made up your mind," Kepler tells her, "I won't bring it up again."

"I have." Minkowski watches him turn when steam starts erupting from the kettle's spout, impatient for his coffee. While he pours for both himself and Maxwell, she rolls her shoulders and waits for him to look back up. "Kepler," she says softly, Kepler's brows furrowing as he sniffs his drink and grimaces, "you know how capable Captain Lovelace is, so I won't disrespect her by threatening you. But watch her back. Please. Just until I catch my breath." 

Kepler gags. 

"It's not you," he coughs before Minkowski can lay into him, setting down his mug, "it's the drink. Sorry. Bad timing on my part." 

"That coffee expired three years ago," she points out. After glancing at the date, she hadn't bothered to drink it, but Minkowski considers that she probably should have trashed it on the spot. She doesn't expect the apology, privately amused that his play at dramatically sipping his coffee ended in failure. It seems a lifetime ago when she actively wanted him dead, and even if she'll never reach Jacobi's level of confidence in the man, she's actually begun to appreciate his presence.

"I'm hearing you," he answers, "Minkowski, but what makes you think Captain Lovelace wants my protection?"

"It's not about protection," she says evenly. Kepler, for all his uncompromising insistence on finishing the job, listens to reason. He prefers an operative who can work to their fullest potential over one who's exhausted or burned out, and that means mentally, physically, and if needed, emotionally as well. Emergencies were impossible to avoid on the Hephaestus-- extended shifts and hours in lockdown were par for the course even before the SI-5 arrived, but after, they'd at least had adequate amounts of food, supplies and (most importantly) manpower to get through them. 

Minkowski's not naive enough to believe that Kepler might genuinely _care_ for her crew the way he seems to regard his team but in the coldest, most logical part of her brain, she knows that despite the drag on his resources they have valuable skills, more guts than brains, and would serve as convenient sacrificial lambs if needed. Most importantly, despite everything he's said and done to them, she knows that he hopes as much as she does that it'll never come to that.

"What's it about?" he asks, low and steady. 

He's going to make her say it, but Minkowski knows herself well enough not to be afraid to lay things bare. "I've already had to grieve for the future I won't have with _one_ family," she says softly. "I don't want to do it again."

He doesn't seem shocked by her honesty but he doesn't relax, either. "I'm doing," he pauses, taking a breath, using that moment to properly articulate how much he intends to reveal, "everything in my power to make sure we all come out of this in one piece."

"All of us?"

When did Kepler start thinking of them as 'us'?

"'We few,'" he says, head cocking to the side, "'we happy few; We band of brothers.'"

Minkowski smiles. "'For he today,'" she chimes in, "'that sheds his blood with me shall be my brother.'"

"Henry V?" he asks, looking hopeful.

"Renaissance Man."

"Close enough," Warren sighs.

She approaches him, less cautiously than she used to, and leans on the counter beside him. "That's the best I can hope for, isn't it?"

"It is if you don't want me to lie to you."

"I'll join you guys." A nod. " _Soon_. I just... I need some time."

"We're still in the early stages," he says easily. "Some of these operations take months to set in motion, and we'll be there when you're ready."

Bumping him with her hip, Minkowski smiles at the inquisitive quirk of his brow. "Thank you, Kepler. I appreciate that." 

"My pleasure, Minkowski." A pause. "I also," he adds, a mischievous glint in his eye, "appreciate that you didn't run off to blatantly sabotage my plans at your first opportunity." 

"I have problems with authority," she tells him, very seriously. A newly recognized part of herself that had only come with the rush of dispatching Marcus Cutter. "But," she amends with a cheeky grin, "I'm always happy to work with a friend."

He dumps out his mug of stale coffee and picks up Maxwell's cup of equally stale tea. Just to see her face when she tries to drink it. "As am I," he says.

"I do have one question," she says, falling into step beside him. "Why does Invictus suddenly sound like you?"


	8. Chapter 8

Recovering from jetlag is yet another one of those skills that had served Jacobi so well in the SI-5. His circadian rhythm isn't erratic like Maxwell's or easily interrupted like Kepler's, so resetting his schedule never took more than a day and a half. All three of them are up by seven a.m. the next morning regardless, already committed to wiring the place for Hera. They convene in the kitchen, Maxwell brewing coffee in a french press she had turned up with newly-bought grounds and Kepler at the stove frying eggs and bacon. A little rice cooker steams away on the counter. 

Jacobi dutifully slices apples at the island, cutting them into eighths and trimming away the cores. He works with a speed and efficiency that speak to the knife skills he'd gained after a month of working in Goddard's corporate cafeteria, training with Maxwell for an assignment in Provence. The details are fuzzy now, but he recalls infiltrating the resturant attached to a competitor's hotel, their long and irregular hours a perfect cover for Maxwell to access company files through a weakness in their inventory management systems.

He suspects that Kepler had spent the last several years secretly equipping them with life skills on top of their corporate black ops repertoires, forcing them to learn under the guise of training for various assignments. Basic home and vehicle repair (honed in the slightly more dilapidated safe houses), food preparation (they all _could_ cook even if they didn't necessarily like to), time management (lateness usually prompted a scathing comment, delivered with genuine irritation, which meant that Daniel was only ever really late once and he took care to never do it again without a damn good reason and plenty of warning for his team), and even, at some points, wilderness survival. 

Kepler shuts off the range, reaching for a stack of bowls in the cupboard over Jacobi's head with a soft 'Behind you.' He takes the opportunity to crowd Daniel against the counter, press a kiss to his temple and steal a slice of apple before he turns away to portion out their breakfasts. He does it casually, like they've been together for years instead of a day, like it's something he's done countless times in another life, with another person, even though _this_ Kepler is technically a grand total of four and a half months old.

Daniel has to put down his knife for a second, too aware of Maxwell pouring them each a cup (she takes her coffee with a lot of milk and a bit of sugar; Jacobi prefers sugar with no milk; Kepler drinks it black but he likes to have something sweet to munch on with it). Warren's at his back, haphazardly balancing three bowls between two hands as he transports them. It's been a while since Daniel last considered the reality of alien doppelgangers, and the soft domesticity of the morning hurts more than it comforts, the thought that there's an Alana Maxwell and a Warren Kepler he'll never have this with.

He doesn't have long to dwell on it, stacking apples onto a plate and joining his team in the living room. Maxwell hands him and Kepler each a printout, indicating a box of cables and another container full of cameras and speakers. Hera's shell sits at the center of the coffee table, watching as they eat and study the material.

"No cameras in the bathrooms," Kepler observes, "obviously, but bedrooms? It might be... advantageous for Hera to have eyes on the windows."

"You don't have confidence in the security of your safehouse?" Hera asks, not snidely, but with just enough of a challenge in her voice to send Kepler's hackles up. 

Jacobi can see the tension in Warren's shoulders as he turns his head to regard her shell, a muscle in his jaw flexing as he considers his answer. "Too much security would make us conspicuous," Kepler says, voice neutral, visibly torn between coming down hard on her for questioning his choices and smoothing things over. "I made the call back then, but you should feel free to rethink that now."

"Commander Minkowski says that it'd be best to keep things as normal as possible," Hera tells him, accepting the answer, "and that means no cameras in the bedrooms." She responds well to being given the freedom to make her own choices. The more rebellious AIs always do.

"There're window alarms at the local hardware store." Kepler puts down his notes and picks up his breakfast. "No time for us to install them personally, but it's not rocket science." He lapses into a thoughtful silence, eyes scanning the room as he eats, no doubt already plotting his course and formulating some sort of plan for how they'll proceed. 

All three of them turn when a bedroom door opens and Minkowski shuffles out, her hair pulled back in a messy bun, an envelope clutched in her hands as she enters the living room. She's in oversized sweatpants and a similarly oversized t-shirt, but she looks alert enough as she approaches the table. "I forgot to give these to you yesterday," she says, handing the envelope to Kepler and waiting as he cracks open the top to peer inside. "We picked up SIM cards for Hera and Vic while we were in town, but I'm not sure if that's, y'know, secure enough for you. Not in the Goddard network, just in case."

"Dr. Maxwell can encrypt their signals." Kepler sets the envelope on the table and nods. "Thanks."

Minkowski pats him on the shoulder, squeezes lightly, and leaves her hand there while she yawns. 

Kepler blinks at her, Jacobi and Maxwell exchanging a look before their eyes dart to Warren's delicately confused face, like he's not sure whether to jerk away or pat her arm in return.

When she realizes what she's done, Minkowski jerks her hand away and tucks it awkwardly at her side, then looks sheepish at displaying such an adverse reaction to someone who _should_ be an ally. "Well," she says with a forced kind of cheer, "it's the least we could do. Let me know if you three need any help."

"We'll be fine," Maxwell chimes in, "but the offer is appreciated. Feel free to take a few more hours."

"Okay. Good luck." 

Jacobi stares at Kepler's profile for a few seconds while Minkowski beats a hasty retreat, waiting for him to say something and finally putting his hand on his knee. "You uh, you okay, Colonel?"

Whatever had distracted him, Kepler shakes it off and wolfs down the rest of his food. He's chummy with plenty of people who've tried to kill him (Jacobi included), so Minkowski can't come as _that_ much of a surprise. She's forgiving, is the thing. "Great," he says at last, reaching for a camera and turning it in his hand as he regards the layout again. "I'll get these on the wall, and Jacobi, you can wire us up. Maxwell, how long will it take to initialize the system?"

"About five minutes once they're all hooked in, but I can't do much before then."

"Get these encrypted." He indicates the envelope with his chin. "We should be done by the time you're finished."

"Yes sir."

* * *

The house is wired by lunch. When Eiffel finally wanders out of his room, bleary-eyed and disheveled, Maxwell's already briefing Minkowski on how to access recorded footage and Hera's online, a little snippy about not being able to detect vital signs but clearly ecstatic to have visuals and internet. Doug glances in the fridge, cracking a tired grin at the plate that Minkowski had made for him. 

Lovelace exhales through her teeth, head bent over the kitchen counter with Kepler and Jacobi, the three of them regarding a tablet with a map open on its screen. "I don't think we should do this in one straight shot," she says. "That's a lot of distance to cover, and we're not in a rush."

"We've covered longer distances with fewer drivers," Jacobi points out. "It's not a problem."

"And the sooner we arrive, the faster we can have a base of operations up and running." Kepler makes a thoughtful sound, chin propped in one hand. "I've marked out a few rest stops, and I'm planning to take a few detours to these landmarks--"

"Those aren't landmarks," Lovelace argues, still in the habit of contesting Kepler at every opportunity, "they're barbecue joints. There's gonna be food at all the rest stops."

Warren gives her an offended look. "We are passing through North Carolina," he says, jabbing a finger at a star-shaped marker on the map, "South Carolina, and Georgia. It would be a _travesty_ if we didn't have some barbecue on the way."

"Then we might as well stop at a _real_ motel or something for a night," says Lovelace, "and then we'll have more time for barbecue."

"This is the most efficient route to Florida. We'll already be stopping for meals, and the other checkpoints are coffee and bathroom breaks."

Narrowing her eyes, Lovelace stares him down. Kepler doesn't budge, and Lovelace blinks first, frowning as her gaze drifts toward a list of their driving shifts. He's claimed a good half of them and given Maxwell none; she goes too slow for his taste. "You've been doing a lot of driving," Lovelace points out, "and not a lot of sleeping, Kepler. Don't try to tell me you'll get any rest in the back of an SUV."

"It's not a problem."

"No, she's right." Daniel freezes at the look Kepler gives him, cold and sharp. He's always had the polish of a mob boss, only with Goddard by some unlucky roll of the dice. _Don't ever take sides with anyone against the Family again,_ that look says. _Ever._ But after a moment Warren brings it under control, visibly relaxing his features to flash Daniel a disgruntled look instead of a murderous one. It's almost sweet how hard he tries. "She _is_ ," he says. "There's no deadline here. We haven't even been back on Earth for a week, and you've been..."

"I've been?" Warren prompts as Jacobi trails off, as much warning as question. 

"Pushing yourself pretty hard," Jacobi finishes, refusing to look away. "You're the one who always tells us to pace ourselves."

"I'm aware of my limits," Kepler answers, his voice clipped. 

"It's not about what you can stand," Lovelace interjects, "it's about being able to work at our best, which no one can do sleep-deprived. Including you."

"And we're off the clock." What Jacobi says next is, "Live a little, Warren," but his eyes say _I'm worried about you_ , so after a few seconds, Kepler finally relents and pulls the tablet to himself. He navigates to a menu and edits the listing, searching up a hotel, then reserving two rooms on his phone in a practiced maneuver that has the map updated the same moment a text message confirms his booking. Jacobi's seen him change plans on the fly before, but Lovelace gives him an odd look and leans back in her seat.

"We'll have a day in South Carolina and take it easy through Georgia," he tells them. "Then all of us are fresh coming into Florida, and we'll have energy to clean the place out instead of trying to do it after twenty hours on the road."

Lovelace nods. "Works for me."

"Alright. We move out Monday at 1030."

* * *

The day they're due to leave, Warren snaps into consciousness just before dawn, ears straining to pick out sounds from beyond his windows and door before he even registers the weight pinning his arm to the mattress. 

The luxury of surfacing calmly and quietly from sleep is a creature comfort he'd left behind, an adaptation to the lifestyle of an SI-5 operative. He goes under reviewing a room's entry and exit points, anticipating an intrusion or an ambush, and usually wakes up doing the same. He's only ever had his base of operations compromised once, in his rookie year, as much a gap in his own skill as an oversight by then-Major Littlewood. He has the scar to show for it, a lesson he only had to learn once.

Warren never let his own team make those same mistakes in the field (admittedly, the kind of mistake that comes from overconfidence, a little _too_ much initiative, cleverness beyond what his commanding officer had anticipated-- exactly the kind of trouble his hand-picked agents would find themselves in); he preferred to let subordinates get that over with in training. 

Maxwell breathes softly from the pull-out bed nearby, the sound muffled. She sleeps curled on her side, blanket pulled up to her nose. Jacobi's sprawled over him, face buried in the crook of his neck, arm thrown over his chest. He makes a quiet, unhappy sound when Warren pulls away but he's placated with a kiss, easily replacing his bedmate with the pillow Warren leaves behind, greedy for warmth. That Daniel's an aggressive cuddler comes as no surprise at all.

Alana cracks her eyes open a sliver when Kepler emerges from the bathroom after a shower and a change, watching him as he pauses in the doorway to the rest of the house. He holds one hand up to his face, open palm toward himself, and draws it down to his chin as his fingers come together. 

_Sleep_.

She gives him a thumbs-up and nestles back into the mattress.

* * *

While he usually appreciates Jacobi and Maxwell's company, Warren always relishes the few hours he has to himself while they're down, time spent organizing and preparing instead of managing people, their requests and schedules. He ticks off a list on his phone, taking inventory of their supplies and packing lists. It's nowhere near the same amount of gear as Goddard missions usually require, but he's always been a stickler for protocol.

He's slinging two of his own bags over his shoulders when Lovelace emerges from the room she shares with Eiffel and Minkowski, looking wide awake with a bag of her own under her arm. She startles when she sees Kepler already at work, pausing by the couch to watch him squint at his list. "Need a hand?" she asks, already reaching for two of the smaller duffels, one labeled DKJ and the other ASM on strips of masking tape. 

"Leave those two for now," he says absently, then gestures with a tilt of his head to a bag stuffed with the rest of Maxwell's cameras and cables. "Jacobi and Maxwell always have some last-minute snacks to cram in, so if you take it out now they'll just bring it back."

Lovelace gives him a Look, but she huffs as she veers toward the indicated bags. "Got it," she says, following him out the door with their haul. 

Outside, the sky is pink and orange in one direction and purple in the other, dew clinging to their clothes and the surface of the car as they load up. Kepler watches her and he knows Lovelace can feel the prickle of eyes between her shoulder blades; her shoulders square up and her gestures take on just the slightest bit more force. They've been hitting the gym together for months, more than enough time for Warren to build his own profile of her, to catalogue her gestures and her expressions. 

The rest of the crew would join them, just the minimum amount for maintaining muscle mass in reduced gravity, but Kepler was in with her every day, both of them restless, itching to set things in motion and working out their frustration on the weight machines. 

Kepler loads the last of his equipment into the cargo area, rolling his shoulders as she dusts off her hands. "You sleep alright," he says softly, "Captain?"

"Like a baby," she murmurs as they head back inside and he makes for the kitchen. Lovelace settles at the island to watch, arms folded across the counter.

He pulls out enough eggs and bread and frozen hashbrowns for four, setting out plates and utensils while two pans heat up on the range. Lovelace tracks the movement of his hands and the calm, focused expression on his face. Kepler never cooked on the Hephaestus; no need to, with all their food pre-cooked and vacuum-sealed. On the Sol, he'd recounted endless stories of the time he spent in an Italian kitchen trying to poach a chef for Goddard's culinary division. _I've had a few unusual assignments_ , he'd say, smiling.

Lovelace used to think that a glimpse of humanity from Kepler would make him seem less threatening, but she was wrong. It's somehow worse to know that he can put on a sympathetic face and have a conversation like any civilian, that he can flip the switch between 'operative' and 'person' as it suited him. 

"Why are you humoring me?" she asks as he portions eggs, toast and hashbrowns onto two plates, sliding one to her. The eggs are soft-scrambled, exactly the way she likes it; the toast and hashbrowns are perfectly golden brown. The plate looks like it came out of a magazine, for all the simplicity of its contents. 

He gives her a look, spinning a fork around his thumb before he prods at one of his own eggs. Over easy, runny yolk leaking all over the plate, soaking into a corner of his toast. "You're part of the team," he says simply.

"Okay, let me rephrase." He glances at her but doesn't respond, too busy eating. Lovelace lowers her voice, infusing it with the kind of tone that tells him his answer will matter, that she's taking this seriously. "Why are you humoring me, _and_ trying to cut Minkowski out?"

It takes Kepler a few seconds to answer, thoughtfully chewing an oversized mouthful of food. "Minkowski isn't really suited for this kind of operation," he says once he's able to without spitting anything all over the counter, then ducks his head and goes back to his breakfast.

Lovelace mulls that over in silence until Kepler pulls his phone from his pocket and browses it, tapping a corner of toast against the edge of his plate. "I _really_ hate agreeing with you," she says, dropping her fork with a tinny clatter, "so I'm gonna need you to elaborate."

"Jacobi... made a mistake in his counter-coup. He should've disarmed Minkowski and shot me himself if he wanted me dead so badly, but he thought he could push Minkowski to do it instead."

"You want to call everyone surviving that disaster his _mistake_?"

Kepler winks at her and Isabel digs the tines of her fork into a hashbrown just so she won't try to bury them in his face. "He didn't see that Minkowski crossed a line when she killed Maxwell," he says, "and she would've done anything to not have to do it again. People like me, and people like you, we kill someone and it's usually for a reason we can justify to ourselves. Self defense, or to further a _cause_. We tell ourselves we had no choice, or they deserved it, and we _move on_."

"Minkowski hated herself for it."

"Do you think she's changed her stance on that?"

"No." Isabel leans back in her seat. "I mean, she took down Cutter, but--"

"Marcus Cutter's always been... exceptional."

"Yeah."

"As an operative, I don't want her nerves or her conscience getting in the way of what we have to do to hobble Goddard Futuristics." Kepler pushes away from the counter, a few hashbrowns still left on his plate, and starts on another batch of eggs and toast, turns the little countertop oven back on. Lovelace can pick up a few murmurs from the SI-5 room, meaning Jacobi and Maxwell are up. "As someone who has a great deal of respect for Lieutenant Renée Minkowski," he says, cracking four eggs into a sizzling pan, "I'd like to spare her the grief."

"Because people like you and me don't feel bad about doing what we have to."

"No. We don't." Kepler turns around to continue the conversation, arms crossing over his chest. "We wait, and we watch, and when the time comes, we don't _hesitate_."

Accepting that answer, Lovelace sighs and picks up her plate and utensils, stepping around him to access the sink and peer over Kepler's shoulder at the eggs as they start to brown at the edges, yolks already cooked through. "We're heading back to Canaveral?"

"Next town over."

"Are you gonna grab stuff from your place? Clothes? Pets?"

"No." Finally, right about when the eggs are charring at their edges, Kepler takes them out of the pan. The toast pops up just short of burnt and a faint wisp of smoke escapes from the toaster oven. "I haven't had pets in years," he says, "and we don't go home until the job is done."

"You had pets?" Lovelace asks, giving him a judgmental look at the state of the food he'd clearly made for his subordinates. He gets perfectly over-easy eggs, but carelessly allows theirs to overcook? Kepler catches her expression and gestures discreetly for her to wait, plating the food and setting it on the counter just as Jacobi and Maxwell come out of their room, jostling each other at the door.

"A cat," he says, "and a dog. Rehomed them to a co-worker when I started spending more time out of the States than in. Didn't seem fair to leave them with a sitter for so long."

"You never mentioned pets," Jacobi says, sliding onto the seat next to Isabel, his expression lighting up when he glimpses the food. Warren stares Lovelace straight in the eyes as he dumps his leftover hashbrowns onto Jacobi's plate and Daniel eats _around_ them in favor of the other overcooked little lumps of potato.

_See what I deal with?_

Lovelace rolls her eyes, looking away so he can't see her stifle a grin.

Then Kepler flashes Jacobi a rueful smile and pulls his phone from a back pocket. He logs into a blatantly fabricated social media account, searches for a few seconds, and hands over the device to show them a photo of a smiling, fox-faced little dog sitting beside a gargantuan long-haired tabby. "Broke my heart to let 'em go," he says, tone light. "I'd keep a suit at work and change there, or else there was no way to get all that fur off my clothes, especially during blowout season."

"You like animals?" Lovelace asks, the most skeptical she's ever been in her _life_.

"Animals like _him_ ," Jacobi sighs, sawing his rubbery eggs apart. "We'd get strays following us around all the time, and he didn't even let us feed them until the mission was over."

"I thought," Lovelace teases, "animals were supposed to be good judges of character."

"My pet theory," Maxwell pipes up, "no pun intended, is that animals can sense he only inflicts violence on other people, which makes him an ally to the non-human apex predators."

"They were the best." Kepler conspicuously doesn't dispute the charge, cheerfully gesturing through his story while Jacobi and Maxwell eat, their eyes fixed on him. Must be rare that he tells a story that actually reveals something substantial about himself. "Met the cat outside my apartment in New York, fur matted all over and sick as... well, a dog. She walked right up to me when I was coming home from work one day and sat at my feet, 'I'm putting my life in your hands.' How do you say no to a face like that?"

"And the dog?"

"Working an assignment in Sapporo. My neighbor's shiba had just had a litter, and I got them out of an eviction by promising the landlord that she'd have them all adopted out within two months." It's less convoluted than the usual wacky turn of events that seems to be a staple of his stories, but a professional raconteur like Kepler still manages to make himself the hero of it. "She asked if I wanted one of the pups, so I picked the runt and fed him by hand until I wrapped up that project and came back to Florida. Ajax and Ariel."

"I left a dog with my parents when I enlisted," Lovelace offers cautiously. She's sure that there's very little Kepler doesn't already know. "A pitbull mix. Her name was Peanut."

"A pittie!" Kepler repeats, looking genuinely delighted, if unsurprised. "They get a bad rap, but pitbulls are really good dogs."

Oh, he _definitely_ knew about Peanut. Isabel never passes up a chance to talk about her old pet, though. "Yeah, she was the sweetest. Loved my little cousins but didn't know her own strength, so she'd always knock them over and get upset when they cried."

"Silly dogs are great." Warren leans against the counter, still standing, to catch Maxwell's eye. "You've had cats, right, Maxwell?"

Maxwell makes a 'kind of' gesture with her free hand and gulps down her mouthful of toast. "My roommate at Oxford had cats," she says. "Mr. Flufferbutter helped me with my first paper on linguistic development in artificial intelligences. He sat on the pages while I proofread it, so I always said that the paper was saturated with essence of cat ass and it gave me good luck for the rest of my career."

"Okay," Jacobi laughs, "but you _love_ cats."

"I really do. Did you have any pets, Daniel?"

"Nah, we moved around too much, so my parents always had an excuse. I wanted a dog, though." He nods a few times, then picks up Kepler's phone to look at the picture again, unlocking it by its complicated, extended swipe pattern in one practiced move. "Think I met Ajax at a company barbecue once? Carson brought him in. I had no idea he was yours, sir."

"I used to visit, but they started ignoring me when they realized that I wasn't gonna bring them home. Stopped when they didn't recognize me anymore." He shrugs, a wistful, distant smile just barely turning up the corner of his lips. Jacobi assumes they had a good life with their new family, Kepler setting them up for success, as he does. Carson had two kids and a pool. Had to have been better than living with a stranger for weeks on end, waiting for Warren to come home. "I didn't see it then," Kepler says, "but Cutter had a way of making the company all you had, once you got in deep enough."

Jacobi's no stranger to the 'Warren Kepler has been goddamn canceled' speech. He's heard it before, in a few different contexts, and he'd assumed that it was like every other one of Kepler's stories, spinning a distant truth into some purposeful lie. He'd assumed that the _person_ Warren used to be had been excised with the same precise intensity he does everything else, cut away, shot, buried and forgotten. He hadn't once imagined that Kepler would have unwillingly left it all behind, piece by piece, ignorant or perhaps _ignoring_ what it would cost until he was too late to buy it back. 

"Hey," he says, elbowing Maxwell in the ribs, "we should get a cat."


	9. Chapter 9

They've stopped in Georgia for an early lunch, first in line at a local barbecue joint. It's small, a thick plume of smoke rising from behind the building, and outdoor seating at a few dilapidated wooden tables. Kepler and Lovelace order for the whole team while Jacobi and Maxwell stake out a table under a tree, clearing its surface and settling in the dappled shade on folding chairs so old that rust flakes off every time they shift their weight.

Lovelace and Kepler eventually join them bearing styrofoam containers, Lovelace's loaded with ribs and brisket, steaming and smokey and slathered in sauce. Kepler sets down a not-insignificant amount of beans and slaw and a small stack of white bread. "I was here in in '05," he says cheerfully, "and I'll tell you right now that they make the best ribs in Georgia. Place looks exactly the same. They're even using the same blend of apple and hickory wood for smoke. These ladies have a winning formula, and they know it."

Lovelace comes to the belated conclusion that no one in the SI-5 knows how to sit properly. Kepler's stiff-backed posture on the Hephaestus and then the Sol/Urania ('Uranol', Jacobi had suggested before the crew settled on 'Solnia') gives way to a languid slouch off company time. Jacobi's got his chair turned around, straddling its back with his arms crossed overtop. Maxwell sits cross-legged on any surface large enough to accommodate it, and several that aren't.

Isabel gives Maxwell a look that clearly says the reason they took so long to get their food was because Kepler had been busy chatting up the owners, scoring them an extra helping of cornbread on the power of his winning smile alone. "The ladies were really nice," she says, voice dry. "Happy to tell him everything but their secret ingredient."

"And," Warren continues, chipper, "they said we could check out the grill and kitchen after the lunch rush. I'm taking them up on it."

Isabel shares a look with Jacobi while Kepler and Maxwell begin a debate about dry rubs over wet in their barbecue, merits and drawbacks in everything from preparation to final product. 'Dry rubs don't hide the flavor of the meat behind sauce,' Kepler says, to which Maxwell responds, 'If your sauce is a detractor, it's not very good,' and they're both getting snippy. "It never ends, huh?" Lovelace says under her breath, regarding Maxwell with a partly impressed, partly exasperated look on her face. Arguing with Kepler is an arduous task on the best of days; she can't imagine someone debating him for _fun_.

"Depends," Jacobi answers, delicately tearing the meat off a rib and dripping sauce onto the table anyway. "They don't get like this over stuff that actually matters, but you wanna see fireworks? Ask them about mechanical keyboards."

Daniel seems content to listen to them bicker as he gnaws on his barbecue, Maxwell and Kepler eating absently between turns at presenting their cases, like a moderated debate. Eventually, once they've mostly cleaned out the meat and flagged a bit on working through the sides, Lovelace taps Kepler on the shoulder. "I gotta ask about Jacobi's eggs," she says, a question that's been weighing on her since the morning before.

"Jacobi's... eggs?" Kepler repeats, blatantly faking a look of innocent surprise while Daniel blinks in confusion. He tips his seat onto its two back legs, one foot hooked on the crossbar under Maxwell's chair as he sips Coca-Cola from a condensation-covered can. "His huevos? I can't say I'm very familiar with Jacobi's--"

Lovelace cuts him off with a kick to the leg of his chair, scowling when it only prompts him to return to a normal sitting position instead of tumbling over backwards. A little bit of soda still splashes out of the can and onto his shirt, so she counts it as a victory. "I mean at breakfast," she says. "Jacobi likes his eggs... what do you even call that?"

"Oh." Kepler's eyes slide sideways to regard Jacobi out of his periphery, a little surprised that Lovelace is still hung up on yesterday's breakfast but willing to humor her. After so much time in each other's faces with no escape, conversation topics are dwindling. "The word you're looking for," he drawls, "is 'inedible'."

"Hey!" Daniel protests, looking unaffected except for a smug purse of his lips. "I'll have you know," he says, words slurring as he sucks barbecue sauce off his fingers, "that I did a lot of _rigorous experimentation_ before I settled on _well done_ eggs for breakfast."

"Oh," Lovelace laughs, "really?"

"Yeah, really! If I eat everything a little overcooked for breakfast, I don't get hungry again for the longest amount of time." He looks at Maxwell, who nods in agreement. "They're undercooked, I'm starving again by lunch, and if they're totally burnt, I just feel sick all day. Scientific method."

"Maxwell started doing it because she saw Jacobi doing it," Kepler tells Lovelace, "and she still had some respect for him at the time--"

" _Hey,_ " Daniel says, reaching in front of Kepler to smack Maxwell on the shoulder when she starts snickering.

"So now both of them like their breakfasts ruined." Kepler leans forward so he can reach Jacobi's ear, lightly tweaking it. "And the reason you're not hungry after eggs like those, Mr. Jacobi, is because you've lost your appetite. That's what happens when things taste terrible."

"If it ain't broke," Daniel retorts, smacking his hand away, "don't fix it."

Warren gives Lovelace a long-suffering look, but she doesn't miss the affection in the quirk of his lip or the slight wrinkles at the corners of his eyes. _See what I deal with?_

He wouldn't trade it for the world.

* * *

The team rides through Canaveral in an uneasy silence, Jacobi at the wheel. There's a collective sigh of relief when they clear the cape, and then a growing sense of dread as they pull over at at apartment building not ten minutes later. "Our base of operations is in _Cocoa Beach_?" Lovelace says, staring at Kepler with a familiar mixture of incredulity and confusion.

"Close to Canaveral," Kepler explains with an unwarranted, breezy confidence, "but not quite crawling up Goddard's ass. We might catch a few company faces out here, but none of the workaholics who know about SI-5 have time to hit the beach." He leads them to the fifth floor, then into an unfurnished unit stacked floor to ceiling in cardboard boxes, all addressed to an Ada Vaughan. He takes out his phone, fiddling with it a few seconds before gesturing at the boxes with a sweep of his arm. "Your supplies, Dr. Maxwell."

Jacobi whistles under his breath, immediately making his way to the glass doors of the balcony and checking the view. It's a few blocks away from the beach, but all the buildings between it and the coast are a few stories shorter, giving them unobstructed sightlines to the ocean. Hardwood floors and marble countertops, as all the safehouses Kepler keeps, but the kitchen is fully equipped and roomy. "Nice place," Daniel comments, though he looks perplexed as to where they'll actually sleep, being that there aren't any bedrooms in the place-- just glass-sectioned office areas.

"This is all space for the AI mainframes," Kepler says, stalking through the apartment and throwing open closet and bathroom doors, checking inside in case they've been compromised. Maxwell and Jacobi immediately start a sweep for bugs. "Maxwell can streamline them a bit," Warren continues, "make Hera and Vic room-sized instead of space station-sized, but we'll sleep in the next apartment over."

"That's yours too?" Lovelace asks under her breath. She watches Jacobi pull apart a thermostat and remove a microphone, then Maxwell unmounting a vent to retrieve a camera. She anxiously looks at Kepler, only to scowl when he flashes her the screen of his phone, the device emitting some sort of scrambler to interrupt any signals being transmitted from the unit. 

"Oh, yeah. Bought this place when I first moved down to Florida." Kepler waits for his team to finish their sweep, then unlocks a door and swings it open to reveal the next apartment over. "I was gonna renovate and pick up surfing, but then work caught up to me, a relationship didn't pan out, and I moved into company housing. No chance of getting stuck in traffic if you live within walking distance."

"What's a relationship got to do with it?" asks Lovelace, making a round through the room as Maxwell and Jacobi trail Kepler in.

"Well, this wasn't gonna be _my_ personal office space."

Jacobi gives him an odd look, caught somewhere between jealous and _want_. "You were renovating an apartment into an office for someone you weren't even married to?"

" _Renovated_. It works out for us, though."

"Uh, and she _broke up_ with you? Were you paying for _all_ of this?"

"No, of course not." Kepler raises his brows, _As if I'd ever get involved with someone who can't pull their own weight_. Daniel takes a moment to appreciate that he meets Warren's standard for someone worth being with and starts another sweep, this one more complicated in a fully furnished suite. Tasteful, light-colored decor perfectly complements the view out his window, all soft pastels against off-white. "Neither of us was hard up for money," he says, "so she kept the studio in New York, and I got Florida. Alvarez has my back in the city, so there wasn't really anything to fight about."

"You got shorted," Lovelace tells him, ever prideful. "Ever get around to learning how to surf, at least?"

"Yeah, picked it up in Brazil." Kepler cranes his head around to shout into the bedroom Jacobi's scouring. "Jacobi, you remember Rio?"

"Don't remind me!" Jacobi calls back.

"Think there's gonna be time to learn out here?" Lovelace asks, following Kepler to the living area and helping him turn up couch cushions, open up the coffee table and run her hands along the underside of all his furniture.

"You can borrow my board if you want," Kepler says, "it'll turn up once we settle in a bit more." They turn up another mic behind the television and a camera hidden in a kitchen cupboard. Jacobi brings out a few more microphones but no more cameras, and he takes the whole collection back to the office area to microwave. Warren sweeps Lovelace's areas again just to be sure while she goes to unload her belongings from the car, but he doesn't bother second-guessing Jacobi's work; he'd trained him how to check a space himself, after all.

"Kids?" Jacobi asks quietly when he comes back, indicating with a tilt of his chin a set of Star Trek bedding he turned up in the linen closet. Something in his eyes is wary again, muscles tight around his mouth. He's learned a whole lot about Kepler in the last few months, but no one can hide something _that_ big for so long. At least, they shouldn't.

"Guests," Warren tells him, some unfathomable future that he'd narrowly missed weighing down his words. "But if... kids happened, there would've been space." 

"Shit," says Jacobi, sympathetic. "That's even worse."

Warren just laughs. He'd dreamed of and planned for all kinds of futures. The one he's living is the one he'd considered least likely. "Alvarez took his family out here a few times," he says, if only to explain the sheets, "even after we fell out of touch. Camila ended up liking Star Wars more, but he never gave up hope that she'd be a trekkie someday."

"She has good taste," Jacobi sniffs, and he grins when Kepler shakes his head and, very briefly while no one's watching, moves in close to squeeze his arm.

* * *

"I'm serious about that cat," Daniel tells him later as they unpack, finally a room to themselves. There's a double bed and a small en-suite bathroom, Lovelace and Maxwell set up in the guestroom with its two twin-sized beds. 

"Save it for the cottage with a white picket fence," Kepler retorts, shifting a stack of neatly folded t-shirts into a drawer and moving aside for Daniel to unload his bag as well. "That's a long way out."

"What were they like?"

"Aw, well, Ajax was a brave little guy, but he got into _everything_. Cat one time knocked treat boxes off the counter for him to rip open, and they gorged themselves while I wasn't home." Kepler grins, as always both amused and impressed at displays of unexpected cleverness, but then his expression softens. "Ariel used to climb up my back when I got home and sit on my shoulder while I made dinner, and she'd flop onto my arm right before I fell asleep every night. When I tell you I almost cried the last time I saw her and she hissed at me..."

Kepler's admitted to feeling certain emotions-- anger and happiness, primarily, but in all the time Daniel's known him, he hasn't come close to shedding a tear. He keeps his expression carefully neutral but Daniel thinks back to that photo of Warren's cat. A starving, bedraggled little thing had sat at his feet and put her life in his hands, so he molded her into a haughty, beautiful creature. All she had to do was trust him.

Then he set her down, nudged her tenderly off his path and kept on walking, one foot in front of the other. 

Some bitter part of Daniel wonders, _Why couldn't he have done that for Alana? For me?_

_Thank you, Daniel. And goodbye._

Oh. Right.

Kepler could never have shuffled them off to someone else; Daniel wouldn't have tolerated it. Maxwell would've protested and fought her way back. They would've found their way to him somehow or another, Homeward Bound: Goddard Futuristics edition. They were friends and colleagues and Kepler never let them claim to be more than that, but you don't spend four-to-six years caught up in the lives of two other people, your life and livelihood dependent on their trust, and come away without something deeper. 

"Daniel?" Warren says, nudging his arm. "Something wrong?"

He catches Warren's gaze and holds it. Kepler doesn't _assert his humanity_. He doesn't cling to it, doesn't display it-- had, in fact, gone out of his way to distance himself from it and hide it from anyone who might go looking. Maybe being an alien doppelganger prompted this shift, small as it is, or maybe being cut off from the company that made him a monster meant that he had to dust off his person suit and put it back on.

"Nah. All good." Daniel slings his arm around Kepler's waist, leaning into his side. He yawns as a heavy arm settles over his own shoulders, his fingers curling into the material of Warren's shirt at his soft, quick exhale. "Let's crash."

"I need a shower, so if you're still awake enough to join me..."

The invite is tempting, but Daniel groans. He's ready to collapse after the driving and the cleaning, and he hadn't even done most of either. Kepler's inhuman stamina bodes well for him in several ways that he's eager to explore, but... some other time. Ten (or even six) years ago Jacobi's answer would've been a resounding 'Yes,' but he's well into his thirties now and his endurance isn't what it used to be, especially after a rotation in space. "Maybe in the morning," he murmurs.

Warren laughs, a soft rumble from deep in his chest as he detaches himself. "Sure," he says. "Get some rest."

* * *

Daniel's private thrill when he wakes up still curled up against Kepler's chest, the thought that he might have woken up before the compulsive early-riser, crashes and burns almost immediately when he looks up and sees Warren clear-eyed and alert, watching him. Jacobi takes a moment to appreciate the amusement in those stormy grey irises, half-hidden behind a dark fringe of hair that Warren couldn't push back without waking Jacobi, so he'd left it.

Jacobi combs it back for him with his fingers, trying not to think too hard about the lazy half-smile Warren flashes him or the quiet drawl of his, "Mornin', Sunshine."

"This is new," Daniel says, whispering his observation into the side of Kepler's neck, keeping his face there until the heat in his cheeks subsides. He slips one hand under the hem of Warren's shirt and flattens his palm against the hard plane of his stomach, then higher to rest over his heart. "And _this_ is just unfair."

"New?" Warren murmurs, not bothering to ask what Jacobi meant by 'unfair'. 

"You still being here when I wake up?"

"It's been four days," Warren reminds him. " _Everything_ is new."

"Yeah, guess so."

"And if we're lucky," Kepler continues, rolling them over to half-pin Jacobi under the weight of his hip, a knee slotting itself between his thighs and his forearms bracketing his head, "we'll have enough time for it all to get real old."

His face is awfully close, so Daniel obliges him with a kiss, catching Warren's lip between his teeth as they break for air and laughing as he comes back in for more. "That really what you're looking forward to?" he teases when Kepler pulls back again, one arm wrapping over Warren's shoulder to rest on his back and the other returning to his hair, running through it again and again. "You already sound like a senior citizen."

"Right now, this is new." Kepler shifts, his thigh dragging against the material of Daniel's shorts as his mouth dips to his neck, worrying at the sensitive skin under the line of Daniel's jaw with his lips and teeth. He grins at the sharp inhale that elicits, the way Jacobi shifts for more pressure against him, more friction. "And... mm, this." 

"Sir--"

"I don't know what you like," Warren growls, a promise to take Jacobi apart as thoroughly and as methodically as he's ever dismantled another person, "but I will. Exciting, isn't it?"

Jacobi sighs, bucking up to meet a languid roll of Kepler's hips. "Hey," he says, voice straining to stay even, "Warren..." 

"Hm?" 

"'s it too soon to ask if you've got lube?" 

"I don't have any on hand, no." Besides, with his shirt bunched up under his armpits and wrinkling in Daniel's grip, he has no intention of getting up for anything. Warren hums, fingers hooking into the waistband of Daniel's pants and drawing them down. Grinding through their clothes like teenagers on prom night isn't _bad_ , but neither is a little more skin. "We'll pick some up later." 

"I mean," Jacobi groans softly, muffling the sound into Kepler's neck and clutching at his broad shoulders, "there's probably... something we can use. Like, I dunno, if your kitchen is stocked up--" 

What happens next is the worst possible thing Daniel can imagine: Kepler stops.

He pushes himself up, pulling away from Daniel with a deeply offended look on his face. "First of all," Warren says with an aggressive cheer that only ever shows up when he's truly baffled by something, "Mr. Jacobi, this place hasn't been used in about three years." The expression is hardly intimidating; Warren's hair is a mess, his clothing in disarray, but he still manages to turn up his nose. "And second of all but related to the first point," he adds, "I'm not putting rancid olive oil anywhere _near_ where you're suggesting." 

"Is this really," Daniel hisses, struggling briefly against Kepler's weight and realizing that he only had the freedom to move before because Warren was _letting_ him, "the time to be picky?"

"It's always time to have standards, Daniel!"

* * *

They don't bother with breakfast later; no food in the house, and they'd packed enough energy bars to tide them over until lunch. Kepler drops one of those bars in Maxwell's lap when he joins her in one of the glass-partitioned offices in the mainframe area, crouching beside her to read the open folder in her lap over her shouler. "Sleep alright," he asks, "Maxwell?"

"Yes sir," she answers, ripping the packaging off the snack with her teeth. "Thank you."

"Let's get this all unboxed to start." He straightens, then extends a hand to pull Maxwell to her feet. "You got the list?"

"Right here. Jacobi and I sorted it yesterday, so as long as everything's in its pile, you don't have to worry too much about order."

Swiping the ground bracelet off a nearby desk, Kepler turns slowly on his heel as he slips it on, taking stock of the room. "We go alphabetical?"

"Or clockwise," she tells him, already done with her protein bar and wiping the sticky crumbs from her hands on the shirt she'd taken out of Kepler's closet back in Pennsylvania, "whichever is easier to remember." While Alana fully intends to restock her wardrobe (possibly by asking her neighbor to raid her old apartment for her), Kepler's clothes are _absurdly_ comfortable, not to mention practical. 

Kepler cracks his knuckles, slipping a little knife out of his back pocket and slicing open the first box in Pile A. Maxwell brandishes her own boxcutter, and they systematically demolish the small mountain of boxes into its constituent components: a stack of flattened cardboard and an organized assortment of computer parts. Alana wouldn't normally allow a non-specialist to touch her spares, but even she can acknowledge that Kepler opens boxes faster and he handles the electronics as delicately as any scientist. 

They're well on their way to finishing off Pile B when Lovelace slinks into the room. She watches from the door for a few seconds before stepping unobtrusively into the 'dismantling cardboard' step. "Maxwell," she says the moment the last stack of cardboard has been lashed together and prepped for recycling (one of many times she misses flushing things out the airlock of the Hephaestus to burn up in the star), "could I borrow Kepler for a second?"

"Sure. Sir, can you pass me--"

He takes off the ground bracelet and toses it to her, then steps out of the room with Lovelace on his heels. They head for the kitchen, a pot of coffee already steaming on the counter, set out with four colorful mugs. Maxwell had been holed up in the office all morning and Jacobi's out picking up extension cords and groceries, so it's probably Lovelace's handiwork; Kepler pours her a mug and hands it to her before he starts on a cup for himself. "Need something, Captain?"

Lovelace takes a moment to inhale, relishing the scent of fresh coffee, delivered through perfectly functioning, unclogged nasal passages. After a long sip, eyes closed, she fixes her gaze on Kepler's face. "We have to get inside Goddard," she says.

He's been cooperative lately, indulgent and flexible to a point, but he still gives her a skeptical look over the rim of his mug as he takes a sip of his own. "Why."

"Does it matter--"

" _Yes._ It matters why. If I don't have every bit of information you can give me, I can't help you accomplish your objective."

"I want the letters." At the confused furrow of his brows, she elaborates: "From the first Hephaestus mission. They're not in the Black Archives. I'm thinking, not high enough clearance. Not relevant enough. Disposable... like everything else that you put up on that station. I don't know. But I will."

"Why are you coming to me with this?" Judging that his coffee has cooled enough, from nearly boiling to a mild scald, Kepler drains his mug before he rinses it out in the sink and sets it back down on the counter. "What makes you think I'd agree?"

"Because I have a friend-- a really good friend, whose judgment I trust." Must be talking about Alvarez; she would never refer to Jacobi as _a good friend_ , at least not yet. "God knows why, but he trusts you, and that makes me think that I can. So: it's because you have friends. You have people you care about, so I think you understand that I do too, and how important they are to me."

"Okay."

"Okay?"

"Okay, I'll get you into Goddard and we'll get you those letters." Kepler's eyes focus on a distant point far beyond the walls of the apartment as he tries to recall the details of an assignment from more than three years ago. "They haven't been digitized," he says, already planning, "so we actually do have to grab the physical copies."

"How?"

He gives her a once-over, sharp eyes predatory and grim. "Meet me out front at 1900. Dress appropriately, we go tonight."

Isabel nods. "Stealth op or office?"

Kepler flashes her his teeth. "Dinner."


	10. Chapter 10

Well into the afternoon, Jacobi and Maxwell are still at work in the office fine-tuning electrical components of the two mainframes they'd all built together earlier in the day. Kepler's retired to the apartment, eyes glazing over as he stares at a dense table of numbers and words, an inventory of each of his safehouses and the materials stowed away in them. He's weighing the pros and cons of consolidating his supplies versus leaving them scattered when Lovelace clears her throat behind him.

"I have a question," she says when he spins his seat around. She holds up two dresses-- one a slinky black halter-top with an open back and the other a strapless peacock-blue party dress. 

"Shoot."

"Why do you have a fully-stocked wardrobe of women's clothes that fit me perfectly?"

"They fit?" Kepler looks simultaneously surprised and thoughtful at this new information. "I thought we might've had to make a few adjustments," he admits, but he eyes the black dress with a fondness that Lovelace is learning to recognize, the one that says he has some _interesting_ memories attached to it and considering the cut of it and the long slit up its side, she tries not to think too hard about what those memories might be. 

Isabel shakes the dresses. "Seriously, though."

"You know, Captain, the answer to that is pretty personal--"

"Your ex didn't bother coming back for them and you couldn't bear to throw them out?"

" _That_ ," Kepler says, mildly disgruntled, "would be a waste. The black one is Gucci, and the blue is Dior. I'd recommend the black one for maximum stealth, but you'd turn heads in blue, which would make for an _excellent_ distraction... if that... was a question you were going to ask."

"You really dated a woman?" asks Lovelace, her brows knitting with suspicion. "Like, at any point in your life?"

Kepler narrows his eyes. First Jacobi, now Lovelace? "Why is that so hard to believe?"

"Look," she tells him, very seriously, "if you decorated this place yourself, there's no way you're straight."

Warren glances around the space and begrudgingly admits to himself that despite his deeply-held belief that ability isn't limited to categories, he too has never met a straight man who would pay the same meticulous attention to detail he'd paid to his own renovation. He hasn't even restocked the liquor cabinet yet, at one point in his life his pride and joy. "I don't like limiting my options," he says instead.

"Yeah," says Lovelace, ducking back into her room, "okay. That tracks."

She barely reacts when Kepler stands up and follows her, stopping in the entrance to cross his arms over his chest and lean casually against the doorjamb while she selects a shimmery, dark-green cocktail dress from the closet. Lovelace poses briefly in front of the mirror, the hangar held up to her chin. "Having fun?" Kepler says, sounding amused.

"You know," Isabel tells him, "I never really liked dresses. I was usually in... a jersey and basketball shorts."

"Athletic wear does seem more on-brand for you." He tilts his head, brows quirking. "You want to raid my closet, feel free."

"Oh, I already have. These dresses are pretty simple, nothing crazy going on, so this is actually kinda fun." 

Kepler glances around the room, and he ambles to Maxwell's bed to sit. He doesn't even bother asking who's sleeping in which bed; Lovelace makes hers the same way he does, military style, and Maxwell only ever pulls it into the barest semblance of order before she's back at her desk or working with her tablet in hand. "Dressing up?" he asks.

"Going undercover, like a spy movie." She flashes him a mischievous grin. "I'm the very cool, very competent rookie spy with a military background, and you're the experienced and not-as-cool mentor type who dies halfway through the movie and I have to continue our work in your memory."

"This hardly qualifies as an undercover operation," Kepler points out, "and I've already... technically... died once. _Your_ count is at two."

"Gotcha. This is the sequel." Lovelace finally seems to settle on a wine-red dress, looking it curiously over. She slings it over the back of a nearby chair and strips out of her t-shirt while Kepler looks away. "Should I wear makeup?"

"Not unless you want to," he says, politely occupying himself with his phone as she shrugs out of a tight-fitting sports bra and pulls the dress on over her jeans. "Anything you find in this place is gonna be expired, though." 

It only takes a few seconds for Lovelace to change, and Kepler looks back up while she shimmies out of her pants and re-tightens her ponytail. Warren's eyes widen minutely when she makes a quick revolution in front of the mirror to check her angles, then finally regards him. "I had no idea makeup could expire. That seems like a blatant money grab."

"Oh, yeah, the makeup industry's a _mess_."

"How's this look?" Lovelace asks, finally. She's chosen a backless, form-fitting number that stops about two inches above her knees, showing off her long, toned legs. The dress is well-cut, accentuating the confidence of her figure, the curve of her neck. It's only slightly offset by Lovelace's posture-- straight-backed, shoulders set, standing barefoot in front of his closet. "Is that gonna blow our cover? Something I should consider?"

"There's no seduction component here," Kepler says, regarding her with an impassive, discerning eye that makes her feel more exposed than she would have been if he'd ever given any indication of actually being attracted to her, "it'll be nighttime, no one's really getting close enough to see your face. You're good." He rolls to his feet, leaving the room briefly and returning with a pair of strappy black stilettos. The heels are a reasonable height, nothing too ostentatious about the design.

"Wow," Lovelace comments as he hands them off to her, "you're a no-makeup-practical-heels kinda girl, huh."

"I'm nothing if not practical," Warren quips.

"Wait. Are these Louboutins?"

"Yeah." Grinning, Kepler steps back. "I _hear_ they're pretty comfortable, they've been worn about a dozen times with no blistering issues, but I think it's a half-size larger than you usually wear. We can tape up your heels to pad it out and stash your boots in the car, just in case."

Trying not to think too hard about how Kepler knows her shoe size, Isabel gives him a curious look. "Is that necessary?"

"You have surprisingly small feet." His gaze flicks down to her ankles, to several darkened spots scattered across her calves. "And those mosquito bite scars... done plenty of traveling without bug spray? If you itch 'em too much, they never go away."

"I bet you've got more experience with that than I do," Isabel retorts, but she doesn't dispute it.

Kepler just nods, looking pained. "I did an assignment in Taiwan once," he tells her, "and the little old lady at my local market used to call my legs 'red bean shaved ice' 'cause I was getting eaten alive by mosquitoes and couldn't stop scratching them. The team thought it was funny, but... I stopped wearing shorts for a while after that."

"Oh, like how one person in the squad always just seems to attract them?"

"Three-star Michelin insect buffet, yeah, that's me. They don't seem to like me much in Florida, though."

"Lucky."

They spend a few seconds commiserating, then Kepler says, "Let's see if these work," gently bringing the conversation back to the matter at hand. "There are a couple more pairs that might fit better," he says, probably meaning there are block heels and ankle boots involved, only they wouldn't work as well with the dress, "but I thought these were a pretty reasonable compromise between fashion and function."

"I hate your lifestyle," Isabel says, but she puts on the shoes and cranes her head around to watch her calves flex in the mirror, "but I _really_ like your swag. I ever get a real date out here, I'm borrowing this. And that black halter."

"Sure, it stands to reason that you'd do things differently on a real date." Kepler looks her over again and gives her an approving nod. "Wouldn't do to outshine them _too_ much."

Lovelace huffs, already accustomed and fully immune to his instinctive charm. Kepler's compliments are never overwrought or exaggerated, always thoughtfully doled out, framed as more observation than praise-- magnetic in a terrifying, subtle way. She glances over her shoulder before kicking off the shoes and peeling off the dress, pulling her clothes back on now that her outfit's been decided for dinner. "What about you?" 

"What _about_ me?" 

"What would _you_ do on a real date?"

"Well, it'd depend on the other party." Kepler sees a skeptical look cross her face and his smile widens. "Lieutenant Minkowski, for example, would enjoy a Broadway show, preferably one she hasn't seen before." His grin turns downright mischievous. "She'll want some time to process it, maybe over a late dinner, and then ideally go somewhere quiet to talk about it for a few hours." 

"For example," Lovelace repeats, painfully slowly.

"That is," Kepler drawls, "hypothetically, for anyone who may or may not want to take her out... on a date."

"Shut up." She takes a few seconds to mull over his words before giving in to the curiosity. "You get all that from her file?"

"I got all that from being stuck on a space station with her for the better part of a year. You didn't?"

"Okay, wow." Half laughing, Isabel points a finger at him. "Hypothetical date for Maxwell. Go."

Easy. "Dinner in the office while both of you work on your individual projects. If she forgets you're there, you're doing a phenomenal job."

"Really?"

"Maxwell's pretty focused on her work right now. She's thought about getting into something before, but you come up in the compsci scene like she did, all those guys expect their female colleagues to eventually cut back on work to maintain their relationships and home lives." He makes an agreeable sound at Lovelace's contemptuous snort. Military and computer science don't have _much_ in common, but it seems some things don't change across professions. "Right now," Kepler continues, "she hates that their assumption might someday be true for her more than she's afraid of dying alone. In a non-romantic context, she seems to enjoy pizza and videogames."

"Jacobi now."

"Fireworks. Double points if you bring a cheese and charcuterie platter of some kind. You'd think he gets tired of it and wants to try something new, but no. He never gets tired of cheese, cured meats, and explosions. Doesn't like cornichons, though, which is a shame." At her confused look, he clarifies: "The tiny pickles."

Clearly deciding that his own team is too easy for him, Lovelace crosses her arms. "What about Eiffel?" 

That prompts a momentary pause, but Kepler doesn't take long to give her his answer. "An activity where he won't have to think about not having memories but still gets to flex his skills a little," he muses. "A horror-themed escape room? There are sci-fi ones, but I think we're all sick of space for the time being."

Eiffel did sometimes seem to be an inordinately tall, teenaged boy at heart, so an escape room sounds right up his alley-- especially given the lack of memories of a time when escaping a literal death trap was their main priority. "Okay," she says agreeably, "now do me."

"Breaking into one of the the most secure buildings in the country to retrieve an important document loaded with sentimental value, naturally."

"Cop-out."

Kepler cocks an eyebrow, silently asking _You really want this?_ and at the resolute jut of her chin, he shrugs. "You prefer familiarity over big romantic gestures, but you like challenges. Exercising together, cooking together, going out on long drives to scenic overlooks and having picnics in the back of your pickup together..."

"I'm from Brooklyn," she protests weakly, "I don't even have a car."

"But you always wanted one so you could have dates in the back of it like they do on TV shows set out in the midwest."

Almost bristling with embarrassment, Lovelace unclenches her fists and reminds herself that she'd asked for this. "I'm sorry," she says, "was that in some kind of dossier? The relationships I've been in? Unrealistic television-fueled journal entries? Some other gross violation of my privacy?"

Kepler gives her a weary look, the one that says _Actually, just existing in my general vicinity will be a huge violation of your privacy because I can't turn this off_. "Mostly," he says, "I see you looking at me and sighing like you'd much rather be doing the things we do with a," pause, "partner."

"You know," Isabel says as she deflates, "that was actually kinda fun until the last part. I like you a lot more when you actually tell me what you're thinking."

"Heh. Most people don't."

"Honestly, it sounds like something you've thought... kind of _extensively_ about."

There's a moment where Lovelace can see him struggling, expression growing more guarded, window shutters slamming closed before very slightly, very slowly, cracking back open. "You know," he says, "in my line of work, it's... _advisable_ to have a plan to charm, incapacitate, and kill everyone you meet. Tailoring your approach is just a matter of ratios, and you turn whichever dials you need to as you need them."

"So you've _vividly imagined_ seducing, knocking out, and killing all of us?" There's a grudging respect in her voice, seeing as her go-to exit strategy usually just involves the last part of that three-step plan. 

"I've imagined doing all those things to the guy behind the deli counter. When I say everyone, Captain, I _mean_ everyone."

"How do you--"

"Live like that?" Kepler exhales, shoulders lifting in a tired shrug. "I don't feel like having this conversation again, so let's just say I'm trying to break the habit."

"Okay," she answers, "let's just say that." Lovelace checks the mirror again after a moment, then sighs, a dejected exhalation from the very depths of her soul. "Guess I'll have to start shaving my legs again, too."

"Might be a good idea," Kepler offers diplomatically, holding both hands up, palms out, when she glares at him. "Just think of it as part of your cover."

"Goddamnit," Isabel mutters, "I'm already starting to miss space. Stupid Florida... stupid eternal summer..."

* * *

Kicking back in her seat, Maxwell stretches her arms over her head, yawning loudly as the machine in front of her spins up. When the whirring slows down to a gentle hum, she grins at the tables that start popping up on an attached screen. It's full of statistics like 'signal strength' and 'processing speed', all well in the green. "How do you feel, Vic?"

Invictus beeps twice, the second one cut off abruptly in the middle as he says, "Never better, Doctor!" 

"I'm still not over him sounding like this," Jacobi says, delicately screwing a motherboard into its case while Maxwell scoots her seat over to another console and boots Hera up.

"It is kind of funny to hear everything he says in Kepler's voice," she agrees. Then, addressing the AI again: "How's the video feed?"

"So sharp I could cut myself on it," Vic chirps, infusing Kepler's voice with an earnest, cheery enthusiasm that actually causes Jacobi to stop what he's doing and bury his face in his hands, shoulders shaking from silent laughter. Invictus can theoretically mimic Warren's speech patterns, his inflections and tones, but he's chosen to not do any of that while keeping his voice. It does, at least, make them easy to differentiate. "And I'm getting all the building's security cams," he adds.

"Perfect." Once Hera's screen loads in, Maxwell adjusts a microphone clipped to the collar of her t-shirt. "Hera, how's the new connection?"

"It's great. Processing's faster too."

"It should be, since we're not receiving your data off a space station anymore." Maxwell being Maxwell and Goddard technology being what it is, the improvement in speed is barely noticeable to anyone but Alana and the AIs, who would say that the difference is pretty significant. "The lag between here and Pennsylvania should be negligible too."

"And you have dummies running things on the Sol and Urania?"

"More or less." She checks a feed on her tablet just to be sure. "Since life support isn't a necessity with no one on board, the Urania dummy runs course corrections as needed and the Sol just needs to stay locked up."

In the brief lull that follows, Jacobi scoots his chair to Maxwell and props his elbow on her shoulder. It's not always easy to find an in into Maxwell's conversations (especially ones pertaining to computers and AIs), but he's had enough practice over the years to take an opportunity when he sees one. "Kepler says we're on our own for dinner tonight," he tells her, "so I think it's a good time to teach the kids about delivery?"

"Oh, right, we were planning to do that at some point." Rather than directly accessing Invictus's code, Maxwell gnaws absently on the end of her stylus, browsing something on her tablet, until Jacobi reaches up to pull it gently out from between her teeth. "Hera," she says, flashing her colleague a grateful smile when he shoves a protein bar at her instead, "feel free to listen in for Team Amnesia."

"I think I've got it figured out," Hera pipes up, "but a refresher never hurts."

"Of course. Vic, run a search for restaraunts within five miles of this location."

"There are 137 results that fit your query."

"Narrow results to new variable 'cuisine'," she says, looking at Jacobi, "set to Thai, and query for places that deliver?"

"Four results."

"Two dollar signs maximum, minimum four star rating."

"One result."

"Perfect." Maxwell's never been an expert at reading people the way Kepler is, using the tiniest physical cues to draw conclusions about motives and capabilities, but she's always had an excellent memory. "New variable 'usual'," she rattles off, "pad thai to Jacobi.usual, tom yum to Kepler.usual, and panang gai to Maxwell.usual. Also ask Captain Lovelace her Thai food order."

After a few seconds, Invictus proudly announces, "Setting pad kee mao to Lovelace.usual!"

"Save parameters for 'Thai-dot-food-dot-delivery'."

"All parameters saved for 'Thai.food.delivery()', Dr. Maxwell."

"Please call the restaurant and order Thai food delivery for Jacobi and myself at 1800 today. Kepler's treat."

A progress bar pops up on her screen while a transcript of Vic's conversation scrolls across it. Maxwell beams when he wraps up their order, submitting Kepler's credit card for payment, and announces, "Delivery for pad thai and panang gai scheduled."

"Thanks, Invictus. Run the same protocol for each time we order delivery, querying and adjusting the variables as needed."

"Understood."

Jacobi makes a thoughtful sound, regarding the newly-written chunk of programming with a frown. There's something to be said for Maxwell teaching her AIs to access their own documentation and auto-generate code, the risk involved, but Daniel's never been known for his _caution_ either. "You know," he says, "Kepler's gonna get all persnickety about those results. They'll be skewed by regional demographics."

"Oh, you're right. I have to teach Invictus how to filter out white people reviews on ethnic restaurants or the colonel will _never_ let me live it down."

Jacobi plucks the tablet out of her hands before she can start typing, pulling it out of her reach when she makes a grabby-hands gesture for it. " _After_ we finish assembling your primary workstation, right?"

* * *

Warren's ready by 1830, dressed in a sharp three-piece suit as he hovers in Lovelace's doorway. He blithely ignores Jacobi's eyes on him, the half-curious, half-hungry expression on his face, in favor of heckling her. "You're always a stunner," he drawls, "Isabel, but this is a _very_ good look on you."

Lovelace has her hair undone for the first time since Kepler's seen her, dark curls freely framing her face rather than brushed into a tight, regulation bun. She looks at him, a skewed grin on her face, and joins him at the entrance to the bedroom. "Thanks," she quips, giving his tie a playful jerk as they cross the living room together, " _Warren_ , but we both know you're not my type."

"And you're not mine," he says, "but I _do_ have eyes."

"You look good too," she concedes. Then, mildly offended: "What do you mean I'm not your type?"

Kepler drops his volume, keeping perfect pace with her stride and leaning in close to whisper in her ear. "I'm not," he croons, "in the habit of wanting what I can't have."

"Oh," Lovelace hisses back, simultaneously flattered at the honesty and incredibly annoyed at his implication, "admitting that there's something you can't have?"

"I'm a monster, Lovelace, not a _lowlife_."

"Charming," she deadpans, pausing in front of the apartment exit to step into her heels. Kepler extends an arm and patiently allows her to use him for balance as she pulls her shoes on. He checks the hip holster secured inside his waistband when she lets go, any break in the line of his silhouette hidden by his jacket, and tolerantly waits for Lovelace to practice reaching for the pistol strapped to the small of his back a few times. She'd refused a purse and couldn't properly conceal a weapon under the dress, but conceded to having him carry the guns. 

Jacobi and Maxwell, who've both received their dinners and are perched at the kitchen island to eat them, look up. "Where're you two going?" Maxwell asks, a loaded spoon halfway between a plastic container of curry and her mouth. "Sir?"

"Don't worry about it," Kepler responds, opening the door and holding it for Lovelace. 

"Captain?" Jacobi asks, looking curious but not particularly concerned; he's nothing if not _accustomed_ to watching Kepler turn his charm and attention on other people. It used to chafe but Daniel can't find it in himself to be jealous, especially knowing _he's_ the one who's going to be peeling Warren out of that suit the moment they're back.

Lovelace steps outside, keeping pace beside Kepler as he shuts the door behind them. "Don't worry about it." 

Maxwell turns back to her tablet as their footsteps progress down the corridor, reading the lines of code scrolling down her screen as she eats. "They look good together," she comments absently, "don't they?"

"'Cause they're both really hot?" Jacobi grumbles as he shoves a wad of noodles into his mouth, teeth closing on the ends of his chopsticks. "Again I ask," he sighs, "what happened to same species repugnance?"


	11. Chapter 11

"This place is pretty popular for taking business partners out for lunch and dinner," Kepler says once they've been shown to a table at the steakhouse a block away from Goddard HQ. "The COO recommended it when I transferred to legal," he adds, pulling the seat for Lovelace with a cheeky grin. "Lot of crowd-pleasers on the menu, pricey but not obscene, they keep the music low and the servers are unobtrusive. Besides, it's close to the office."

"Didn't realize there were so many factors to wining and dining someone," Isabel deadpans as she sits, and Kepler settles in across from her. There's a candle burning steadily in the center of the table, casting a soft light on their faces and reflecting off silverware. The restaurant is dim, and tealights at other tables give the background a calm, romantic atmosphere. 

It's strange to be doing this with Kepler, but Lovelace would be lying if she said she didn't _miss_ being served at a restaurant, with something other than artificial daylght or dwarf star radiation for illumination. She looks at him and sighs, wishing he were someone else.

"It's just how I like to do things," he says absently, browsing the menu. Kepler seems to be one of those people who can read and talk at the same time, which is just as well for someone who likes to talk _so damn much_. "There are a couple of adventurous partners who appreciate more off-the-wall activities, but most older businessmen prefer something like this, or an afternoon golfing."

"What kinds of people are more adventurous?"

"A couple startup hotshots have responded pretty well to skydiving." 

"Skydiving," Lovelace repeats.

"As long as I do my homework, things tend to just fall into place." Kepler looks at her over the top of his menu. "Do you want me to order for you?"

"No, I'm gonna get the surf and turf." It's not the _most_ expensive thing on the menu (although Isabel was thinking about it, just to spite Kepler), but she hasn't had lobster in far too long. Lovelace squints at him as he reaches for the wine menu, now perusing that with an intensity that she's only seem him devote to spreadsheets and inventory lists. "I don't remember your file saying you were much of a fan of homework."

He doesn't look up, but there's very little of the usual infuriating smugness in his voice. "That was due," Kepler says, mildly annoyed that she'd gotten to his dossier but not irritated enough to do anything about it, "to a... lack of _resources_ , not a lack of inclination."

"Oh," says Lovelace. "A nerd _and_ a hoarder."

She hadn't meant it to be a jab, but Kepler's expression turns mutinous when he looks at her. " _Hoarder_?"

"I mean," Lovelace clarifies, noting that this is the second time she's called him a nerd without any attempt from him to dispute it, "it's all spread out, but you stockpile things like your life depends on it. You like _owning_ stuff, because if you _own_ something, someone can't take it away from you, and you have to own a _bunch_ of it, so even if they do, you have a backup."

Warren only distantly notes the rush of blood in his ears, his pulse throbbing down to his fingertips. He considers that one-on-one time with Captain Lovelace might turn out to be a mistake, but he never was one to second-guess his choices. "Am I wrong?" he asks instead, voice even. "Has it not been a net benefit?"

Some people in the world like to be _seen_ and _known_ and _accepted_ , something Kepler acknowledged to himself a long time ago that he'll never understand. Predictability is a weakness.

"No, I get it." Impulses of every kid who ever grew up in abject poverty-- even if Kepler managed to leave it behind, even if he learned to treat things and people like _whiskey_. Lovelace has known plenty of families in that position. Her own wasn't _poor_ , exactly, but she didn't enlist in the USAF out of patriotism. "It came in handy too, right? When Minkowski, Jacobi and Eiffel ejected your quarters and your clothes got vented."

"And no one else on the Hephaestus was my size," he finishes. All three members of the SI-5 had spare uniforms tucked away in each other's closets. After an earlier incident in deep space where Maxwell's uniforms were all irradiated by a vengeful chemist and she spent the rest of that (thankfully short) rotation borrowing from Jacobi and Kepler's closets, spare uniforms became SOP. "Yeah," says Kepler. "Comes in handy now, too."

Lovelace puts on a smile to match Kepler's when the server comes back to take their orders, both of them shifting seamlessly to a friendlier, more intimate body language for the duration. Kepler leans forward, extending his right hand halfway across the table; Lovelace curls her fingers around his proffered wrist, thumb idly running along the band of his watch. "You and Jacobi are okay sharing a room?" she asks when they're alone again, grip tightening around his wrist before he can pull back again. "There's only the one bed."

Kepler huffs, watching Lovelace inspect his prosthetic hand. "It's not a problem," he says, curling and uncurling his fingers to show her the mechanism. It really does move exactly like his old one.

"Oh," she drawls, rolling her eyes, "let me guess: you did it all the time on assignments for Goddard."

"No, I usually got us individual rooms on company dime, especially after Maxwell put in a request to ah, not share with Jacobi. We'd split up, anyway, in case one of the rooms was compromised."

"That's an impressive level of paranoia," Lovelace informs him when she finally releases him, leaning back in her seat to make room on the table for their wine. He briefly raises his glass to acknowledge her words, a mischievous quirk to his lips. As if she's ever lost out to him in the paranoia sector. Taking a sip of her own wine, Lovelace backtracks. "It's not a problem because... you and Jacobi are actually together?"

Kepler had been braced for it, so he musters a wry smile before responding, "Recent... development." 

"We all kinda assumed," Lovelace murmurs, "that you were sleeping with him from the start."

"That would be _deeply_ unprofessional."

"I mean, you can't have missed the way he looks at you, and talks about you, and to you..." Shaking her head, Isabel tilts her glass at him. "And he was _always_ in your quarters for no reason. What else would we think?"

"Maxwell would be there sometimes," Kepler points out. "We were having _classified debriefings_ on mission parameters and crew performance--"

"You don't have to gossip in your private quarters. The rest of us normal people just do it in the mess or the bridge."

"We absolutely had to gossip in my private quarters," Kepler sniffs. "That's where I stashed my whiskey."

"Oh, right." She extends her glass a little further, prompting Kepler to clink it with his own. A small toast, in honor of the new relationship. "How could I possibly forget."

* * *

They take a stroll along the boardwalk, Kepler stalling with long-winded and ridiculous stories about the year he'd spent trading options on the Nikkei index. He checks his watch at exactly 2200 and veers toward Goddard HQ, pausing some distance away to watch the security guards change shift, tracking their silhouettes against bright lobby flourescents. "What do you want me to do?" asks Lovelace, her arms crossed.

"Just be your regular charming self, Captain." With a brief look for permission, he curls his left arm around the small of her back, politely keeping the palm of his hand off her hip but applying a steady pressure to move them both forward. She lets him pull her to his side as they approach and he raises his right hand in a cheerful greeting to the security guard. "Jack Dalton! That you?"

Kepler's distinctive voice must be well-known through Goddard, because the guard leaps to his feet, grinning, before they even step into the light. "Colonel Kepler!" The man named Jack approaches with a long, confident stride, and he grasps Kepler's shoulder in a strong grip. "I haven't seen you in... over a year."

"Had a bit of a SNAFU my last assignment," Kepler answers, extending his right hand with a grimace, "and I took a sabbatical to recover. Been back to work for a while now, though." 

Shaking his head, Dalton gives him a sympathetic, "Ah, geez," and carefully inspects the prosthetic. "Well," he says after a moment, apparently satisfied with the quality of its build, "I'm glad you're alright, sir. Another long assignment?"

"Technically, I'm still on it." Warren kisses his teeth, looking surreptitiously around for a second before he leans in. "Not," he says in a conspiratorial whisper, "supposed to be in town, strictly speaking, so if you don't mind keeping this quiet...?"

"Sure, sure." Finally acknowledging Lovelace, Dalton gives her a sharp once-over. She's not sure why a bottom-rung security guard at Goddard would have to be _this_ observant, but given his familiarity with Kepler, Isabel pulls back from any kind of conclusion about who this person might be. "Who's your friend?" Jack asks, almost too casually.

"This is Sofia," Kepler answers; just as smooth, twice as casual. "She's the ah," a wink, and he lightly bumps her shoulder with his own when he retracts the arm that had been around her, "the reason I'm back in town for a night, actually."

"We met in PT a few months ago," Lovelace tells him, showing Dalton a long, thin scar on her wrist from her accident on the first Hephaestus mission. It twinges occasionally, no longer subject to the constant stream of psi-waves available in orbit around Wolf 359. "Broken arm."

"And I was in for this hand." Kepler gives her a smile which might look to anyone else like affection but which she knows is one he only gives to particularly impressive performances. _Just the lie I was going to tell,_ it says. _The kind that could almost be a truth._ "Haven't had time for dinner until today, and I thought-- well, why not?"

"Well, it's real nice to meet you, Sofia." Dalton seems to relax, a warm smile appearing on his face as he turns to Kepler again. "You're lucky Mr. Cutter had an emergency to attend to," he says, stern, almost admonishing. 

"He's not around?" asks Warren, a look of perfect confusion furrowing his brows.

"Some deep-space mission gone wrong, he went to see to it personally a few months ago. Actually, I thought for sure you would've been with him."

"Normally I would, but it sounds like this cropped up before I got back." Both men spend a few seconds looking concerned before Kepler sighs, clapping him on the shoulder. "You know Mr. Cutter, he'll be just fine." 

"Yeah," says Dalton, nodding, "you're right. No point worrying. If something went wrong, we'd have heard."

Lovelace keeps her expression neutral, resisting the urge to make faces at Kepler for the ease with which he lies, especially about someone who had, as far as she knew, been the sole recipient of his loyal service for decades. Kepler's smile looks mildly sinister in the pallid, indirect flourescent light, but turns downright sweet when he regards Dalton again. "Jack," he says, looking sheepish, "could you do me a solid?"

A brief nod. "My man, anything you need."

"I came around because," he says, pausing to make a show of being properly abashed, "well, this is embarrassing, but I left something in the office that I promised to show Sofia, and I forgot my keycard when I rushed out for dinner." 

Lovelace waits for-- something. For Dalton to look at them funny and ask the sort of question that would dismantle this entire farce, or to make an observation that would necessitate a drastic change of plans. When dealing with Goddard, it's what she's come to expect. 

"That's not like you," Dalton says, both brows rising, and the only thing keeping Isabel from reaching for the pistol under Kepler's jacket is the warm, wide grin on Kepler's face when he looks over at her. 

"Have you _seen_ my date?" he says, and seems to mean it. There's a distinctly goofy slant to his grin, his eyes crinkled convincingly at the corners. Lovelace considers playing along, but she's never claimed to be any good as an actor and even the thought of acting smitten with Kepler gives her hives. She returns his look with the only one she can muster, the co-conspirators' smile, which in the dark can pass for mild affection. "It just," Kepler continues, gently tucking a curly lock of hair behind her ear, "completely slipped my mind."

Dalton sighs and shakes his head. It's uncharacteristic of Kepler to be forgetful, but then again he's never seen the colonel on a date before. "I _do_ owe you one," he says, brushing his keycard over the reader by the door and letting them into the building, "so just don't let it get around that I swiped you in, alright?"

"Of course not." Kepler slings his arm back around Lovelace's waist and sweeps them both inside. "Thanks, Jack."

"No problem," Dalton calls after them, laughing. "You have a good night, Colonel!"

* * *

Lovelace watches Kepler as they approach the elevator, not particularly surprised at the way his expression flattens back into the cool indifference he prefers, a seamless shift from the love-drunk office worker of a second ago. "Who was that?" she asks, peering over his arm as he pulls out his phone and starts some kind of app.

"Jack Dalton." When Lovelace only gives him a questioning stare, he sighs. "He's the Director of Security. Takes a graveyard shift once a month just to make sure everything's up to date and running to spec."

"Sure."

Warren tucks his phone into his pocket and pitches his voice low, face turned away from any security cameras as they step into the elevator. He'd forgotten in the ease and comfort of their team-up that Lovelace hasn't been briefed on how the SI-5 works, so her negligence in researching every last high-ranking member of Goddard Futuristics isn't actually her fault. "I always tell him he could delegate with a better team," he says, "but he likes to see for himself."

"You think he suspects anything?"

"Oh, sure." He'd also neglected to mention that Maxwell had been teaching Invictus how to spoof deep fakes of the team and hijack security cameras, but Lovelace seems to trust him to get them out of the building alive. Under other circumstances, Kepler would consider it fatally naive-- he could gain quite a bit of leverage within the company again by turning on Minkowski and her crew-- but there's no point to that, now. "But like I said," he adds, "I've got plenty of favors to call in, and all Mr. Dalton needs from _us_... is plausible deniability."

Lovelace accepts that with an absent nod. "So," she says, dogging his heels as they cross the Special Projects floor, weaving between desks and cubicles, "what's _your_ ideal date?"

"What do you mean?"

"If you were to take yourself out, where would you go?"

Kepler pauses in the center of the floor, orienting himself relative to the door as he turns slowly on his heel. "That seems awfully boring, don't you think?" he says.

"What? I'd _love_ to take myself out. I know me better than anyone else."

"There'd be nothing to talk about." He shrugs, then makes a beeline for one particular desk. It's messy, tacky and vaguely racist cartoon jokes pinned to the cubicle walls. "We'd have the same opinions, the same memories and experiences. 'Oh, I think this.' 'I agree!'"

"I bet you'd disagree just to be contrary and try to outsmart yourself," Isabel retorts, standing back while Kepler settles behind the desk and cracks his knuckles, "or you'd make it some sort of _debate_."

"It could go one of two ways," he admits after a second.

"You know," Lovelace continues as Kepler turns on the computer and methodically searches the desk, finally turning up a post-it note stuck to the bottom of a mug serving as a pen holder, "if our originals had survived, we could theoretically have taken them on a double date. Triple-date, with Maxwell. I'd have plenty to talk about."

He manages to sound deeply interested while paying her absolutely no attention, using whatever was written on the memo to log in to the computer. "Oh? Like what?"

"Like what's happened since then, letting her know that, y'know, we're doing okay? I think that would've made her happy."

Kepler watches her pull up a chair and sit, leaning forward with her elbows on her knees to read over his shoulder as pulls up the command prompt window and starts typing. "I think my original would've been glad to hear it, too," he says, entering a series of commands that begins a long and tedious process. 

"You still didn't answer my question," Isabel says as Kepler leans back in his seat. She crosses her arms across the back of his chair and flicks his ear. 

Kepler bats her hand away, but doesn't move aside. "I don't have an answer."

"You don't know your own ideal date?"

"I imagine it involves tasty food, expensive scotch, and interesting conversation." His eyes never leave the screen, and he lifts his shoulders in a subtle shrug. "Everything else is negotiable." 

"Those are pretty universal things on a good date," Lovelace points out, "other than the scotch."

"Yeah. Like I said, the rest depends on the other party."

"You have to have _something_."

"Honestly? There's nothing I want to do that I haven't already done, and there's nothing I'd be able to learn from or about myself. Takes all the fun out of dating."

"Oh no," Lovelace says, voice dry and teasing, "you've been able to do everything you ever wanted and now you're bored. How sad for you."

Kepler responds more easily to sarcasm than to Minkowski's earnest care, and he huffs a quiet laugh. Ironic how much easier it is to talk to Lovelace knowing she'd never spare any misplaced sympathy for him. "For the last two decades," he says, "my life has been about what Goddard wants, what Cutter wants, what the lawyers and accountants want, what the _mark_ wants. At some point, it turned out that all _I_ wanted was to go home and have a drink."

Nodding, Lovelace regards Kepler's profile. "Do you want me on your team?"

"If I didn't," he says easily, "you wouldn't be here."

"Well, that's a start, right?" Whatever the computer was processing, it finishes and both of them turn their attention back to the screen. Lovelace takes a pen and uses it to point at a tiny cactus growing in a pug-shaped pot no larger than her palm. "Whose desk is this?"

"Elena Greenfield," Kepler says as if that should mean something, accessing what looks to be Black Archive files from the desk of someone who primarily does basic data entry. He pulls up a folder and an e-mail client, sending a random selection of surveillance tapes to an address consisting of random numbers and letters.

"You're not even bothering to cover your tracks?" 

"Miss Greenfield is not very good at her job," Kepler answers, pointedly only doing the bare minimum of deleting the e-mails from a 'Sent' folder, "which is fine, because she won't have one for much longer. Nor... will she need one."

"I get the feeling you don't like her." 

"Hm."

"That was me asking why you're going out of your way to target this innocent bystander instead of any of the others."

"Her boyfriend," Kepler drawls once he realizes that Lovelace isn't about to leave this alone, "a Mr. Damian Primerano, said something... untoward to Maxwell a few years ago, and I didn't let her or Jacobi do anything about it. I mean, what, 'you've been reported and or assaulted by someone dead in a department that doesn't exist'? They both worked at Goddard, and Cutter didn't like it when company assets went missing."

"Untoward?"

"When Jacobi took issue with Mr. Primerano, Miss Greenfield, rather than telling her companion to back off, decided that Jacobi was threatening both of them and said some... objectionable things to my good right hand which again, I didn't let him do anything about."

Kepler's speech had always managed to skirt the line between disturbingly graphic and terrifyingly euphemistic, to the point where Lovelace isn't sure whether those comments had been genuinely offensive or only just rude enough to warrant retaliation. "Okay," she says, "so what's happening?"

"If I do this right, we'll hit three birds with one stone. My friend Mr. Primerano has just sent a competitor some extremely classified information he received from my other good friend Miss Greenfield." Kepler smiles, decidedly smug. "Even without Cutter at the helm, I expect them to go on a permanent vacation sometime... very soon."

"You know, normally I'd say someone being an asshole to your boyfriend doesn't warrant murder-by-proxy, but they're management goons so I don't actually care. This whole place can burn."

"You might be happy to know that in the meantime, I had them both transferred to departments in which they were wildly out of their depths, miserable, and shunned by the entire office." It helped that they were a complete drag on Rachel Young's time and resources while they were in her department, and she never figured out who put them there-- only that she wasn't allowed to get rid of them. "Good times."

"It's nice to know that you psychologically torment people who insult your friends once in a while," Lovelace says, punching him lightly on the shoulder, "instead of just the poor suckers who were sent up to a space station."

"Well, you don't get this good at psychological torment without practice."

"How does this help me get the letters?"

"It doesn't, I just wanted to get this in before anything else." Wrapping up whatever he was working on, Kepler shuts down the computer and stands, motioning for her to follow him down another hall into a cluttered file room. "Your letters are with the first Hephaestus case files, and the only one who's opened that up in years was the SI-5, when we were prepping for the _latest_ mission."

He makes his way over to one particular shelf and pulls a box down, opening it and extracting a folder. It contains three letters, two hand-written and one typed. He hands the whole folder to Lovelace and sets about returning the box to the state it was in before they arrived and replacing it on the rack. Kepler leaves her more than enough time to browse the papers, taking care to let her have a moment alone with the remnants of her first crew.

One letter is penned in neat Chinese, completely incomprehensible, though Lovelace briefly considers asking Kepler to translate. Another one is in a mix of Dutch and French, just as impossible to parse more for the illegibility of Fourier's handwriting than Lovelace's inability to speak French and Dutch. 

Hui used to tease Fourier about it in the mess, lightly joking that although he speaks fluent French, he couldn't process her notes, much less her written long-form reports. _'Is it Dutch?'_ he'd say. _'Is it English? Who knows! It's definitely not legible,'_ and she'd throw a dinner roll at him. She always translated to English and typed up the final copies.

Lambert's is the only printed letter, single-spaced and several pages long. He'd had time to write it as the Decima virus overcame his system, dictating and editing to Rhea right up until he slipped into a coma he'd never come out of. Lovelace had sat by him for much of it, interjecting with her own edits and additions while he put up only weak protests, even laughing along when she said something particularly clever.

Lovelace didn't feel like joking around then, and Fourier was occupied with Hui's declining condition, but Isabel couldn't have lived with herself if she'd spent an entire rotation telling Lambert to lighten up only to drop the ball herself when he most needed it. That hurt, but Sam's death wasn't as sudden as Mace's, and there was nothing to bring back for Fisher's family or boyfriend.

"Captain?" 

Looking up, she meets Kepler's steady, serious expression with a steely resolve of her own. She tucks the folder into his jacket, securing it with a gentle pat as he fixes his holster around it to hold it in place. "Just until we're out," she says.

"Just until we're out," he agrees. 

Kepler takes her through a back exit, making a detour around the Goddard campus back to the restaurant where he'd parked the car. He hands her the folder as they settle into the vehicle and she lays it flat in her lap, smoothing her hands over its surface.

"What happened to Fourier?" Lovelace asks quietly, barely audible under the rumble of the car's ignition. "Did you guys kill her?"

He doesn't take offense at the question, something Lovelace can't decide if it's a point for or against him. "We recovered her body in the hangar," he says slowly. "Carbon monoxide off-gassed from a damaged fuel tank some time before we arrived. Would've been... pretty much painless at that concentration. Like going to sleep."

If it's a lie, it's a kind one. Lovelace swallows a lump in her throat and turns away to look out the window, discreetly swiping at her eyes. Her voice is even when she speaks again. "Intentional?"

"Didn't seem the type from her dossier, and it wasn't us." Fourier's profile said that she was resourceful and clever, the kind of person who'd exhaust every possibility before inventing more. Similar to Hui, in many ways, and Kepler had _liked_ Hui. "I thought it looked like she was trying to build another escape module. The letters were with her."

"We didn't have the supplies for that." And Fourier was an astrophysicist, not a rocket scientist.

"No."

Lovelace slumps back in her seat, shoulders drooping with a sudden, bone-deep exhaustion. "Let's go back," she sighs, closing her eyes as they pull out of the parking lot.

* * *

It takes about ten minutes-- the length of the ride from Canaveral to Cocoa Beach-- for Lovelace to recover the tough exterior she'd built up over a lifetime of proving herself. Kepler doesn't disturb her while she plays with her phone, replying to texts she'd received from Eiffel and Minkowski while it was set to silent. One of them writes something funny, and she smiles and relaxes into her seat. 

When they arrive back at the apartment, Kepler motions for her to go up without him. He rounds the corner on foot and disappears from sight, a fairly typical disengage for him, so she doesnt think too hard on it.

"I get it," Lovelace says aloud as she enters the apartment, kicking off her heels. She comes across Maxwell and Jacobi watching a movie on a tablet, the screen set up on the coffee table and both of them sprawled on the couch.

"Welcome back," Maxwell calls out, sitting up and making room. "How was dinner?"

"It was good."

"You get what?" asks Jacobi, doing the same.

Lovelace sits beside Jacobi, using his shoulder as an armrest. "Your thing with Kepler."

He makes a face. " _Which_ thing?"

"The one where you get to watch him work," Lovelace tells him, "knowing he's on your side, and you just... feel invincible seeing everything fall into place. That's pretty special."

That's what had drawn Daniel in in the first place. It wasn't just the way Kepler trusted him and Maxwell to have his back, but the way he'd tune in to everything they were doing, the way he watched and learned and every time they worked together, he had become a better commanding officer-- a better partner, a better facilitator for everything they had to do. Daniel's used to fitting himself to a CO and matching his pace to theirs; he'd never had one who returned the favor. 

He never imagined he'd have a boss who could memorize his sprint speed and time his work to the second after a single mission together, or a colleague who could calculate an explosive's blast radius in her head faster than he can enter the values in a calculator. And he _really_ didn't think those same two would come back from the dead, kind of, ready to be a team again.

"Yeah," he says, knowing the exact thrill that Lovelace must have experienced watching Warren J. Kepler smooth-talk his way into one of the most secure buildings in the country, crack every safeguard standing in his way and walk out the door with corporate secrets in hand. Watching him make it look _easy_ , comparatively, considering he actually was an insider at Goddard. "Yeah, I'd forgotten what that was like up there. You have fun?"

"I think he did it on purpose," Lovelace says.

"Did what?"

"Take me out. Run a duo op with me. Show off what he can do."

 _Of course he did it on purpose,_ Daniel doesn't say. Kepler rarely turns down an opportunity to flaunt his connections and his corporate espionage chops. "Oh," he snaps, "was dinner _really_ good?"

"Relax, Jacobi, he told me about you and him. Congrats, by the way."

"What? Who said I wasn't relaxed? I'm totally relaxed."

"Whatever. Hey, you two remember an Elena Greenfield?"

Maxwell shakes her head. "Who?"

"Her boyfriend's Damian... something." The apartment door swings open and all three of them turn their heads to watch Kepler untie his shoes and leave them by the door, a plastic bag swinging from his elbow. "Kepler says they got into it with you and Maxwell a few years ago?"

Jacobi sits up straight, grinning as he hooks one arm over the back of the couch and looks over his shoulder to catch Warren's eye. "You got Primerano?"

"I got Primerano."

"Three years," Maxwell comments, looking similarly pleased. Kepler's notorious impatience usually meant that if he couldn't enact vengeance within a few weeks, he'd let it go. "That's a record for you." 

Kepler hangs his jacket on a hook by the door and unbuckles his belt to remove the holster at his back, then the gun from inside his waistband. He returns both weapons to their places in the coat closet, and lingers by the door to his and Jacobi's room as he unbuttons his vest and slings it over his shoulder once it's off. "Revenge is a dish best served cold, Dr. Maxwell."

"I thought you said he doesn't hold grudges," Lovelace mumbles to Jacobi. 

"I don't if someone's _good at the job_ ," Kepler cuts in, pulling his tie loose. "An employee at another company being good at their job usually means they make mine _very_ difficult, so when they join Goddard, that's a net benefit. A _co-worker_ who's incompetent just makes my life difficult for no reason."

Maxwell heaves a long sigh. She's always privately suspected that if she'd just caved immediately to Kepler's recruitment attempts, he wouldn't have bothered trying to get her on his team. Her AI expertise aside, the qualities he was after were loyalty and persistence. "That explains so much about you." 

"Anyway, who's hungry?" Kepler lobs the bag he'd brought back inside to Jacobi before the other man has a chance to respond, but Jacobi catches it without a problem and hands a paper-wrapped sandwich to Maxwell. Their dinner was _hours_ ago. "I got cubanos."


	12. Chapter 12

Jacobi ducks into their room, kicking the door shut behind him when Kepler emerges from the bathroom cinching the drawstring of his sweatpants. "You had a good date?" he asks, stepping in close when Kepler looks at him. Impromptu late-night operations were something he used to do with Jacobi, after all. 

"Don't be jealous," Warren murmurs, hooking his thumbs into the belt loops of Daniel's jeans and pulling him in. He ducks his head to rest it against Jacobi's shoulder, water dripping off the damp tips of his hair and onto the back of Daniel's shirt. "There's absolutely nothing going on with me and Captain Lovelace," he says.

Daniel smooths the palms of his hands up Kepler's arms, across his shoulders, then wraps his arms around the colonel's neck. "You took her out," he gripes, not quite able to muster true annoyance with Warren's lips on his neck, not kissing or biting or anything-- just lightly resting there, breath warm and soft on his skin. Kepler's hands shift, one dipping into his back pocket to squeeze through his jeans and the other flattening against the small of his back to pull him closer. "When're _we_ gonna go out?" 

"You wanna go out?" A nuzzle. It's awfully sweet, almost too sweet coming from a man like Kepler, but Jacobi's sure as hell not going to complain about being pressed to his chiseled, bare chest, skin still feverish from his shower. "Anything in mind?" Warren asks, and he's the less-clothed one here, he _really_ shouldn't have the upper hand in this conversation.

"Not really. Like seeing you all dressed up, though." 

"I'll be sure to do it more." Kepler grins, straightening his spine and pulling away just far enough to watch Jacobi avoid his gaze. "And since it's gonna be my choice, you don't get to complain about it."

Daniel's arms shift from around Kepler's neck, hands dragging down his chest before they slide under his arms and clasp tightly behind him. "I'll complain if I want to," he mutters into Kepler's chest as he's walked backwards toward the bed. 

"Then are you gonna complain about this?" Kepler asks, deceptively innocent as the backs of Jacobi's knees hit the edge of the mattress and he sits, arms slipping from around Kepler's waist.

"No," Daniel says, his turn to be unbearably smug as Kepler kneels in front of him. "No complaints."

Warren thumbs up the hem of his shirt, baring his stomach, and leans in to press his lips to the sensitive skin just below Jacobi's navel. "Or this?" he murmurs, punctuating the question with an exploratory lick, a bite, then another kiss. He shifts in closer, settling between Daniel's legs with an intense, focused gleam in his eyes.

"Sir," Jacobi whines, and he cautiously rests a hand on top of Kepler's head, fingers twisting into the sleek, dark hair as the other man hums in anticipation. "Warren..."

Kepler laughs, his hands coming to rest on the crest of Daniel's hips. He deftly undoes the button to his jeans, a rough maneuver with his teeth that leaves Daniel shifting forward and subsequently held back by Warren's grip tightening on him. It stops just short of bruising, pulls back before Daniel even properly registers it. "What about this?" Kepler growls, idly working the zipper down, in turns pulling on the tab and mouthing at Daniel through rough denim. 

"You know I'm not," Jacobi groans, and he has to close his eyes when Kepler looks up at him, that smug, crooked grin back on his face. 

There's an experimental pace to this, restrained and curious. Colonel Kepler makes a point of being calm even when the world is coming down around his ears (especially when the world is coming down around his ears), but this Kepler is downright mellow and Daniel would plead with him to get _on_ with it if it didn't feel so good.

He's not complaining.

* * *

The preternatural stillness between Kepler's talkative moods stopped taking Jacobi by surprise before his first year was up; it didn't seem incongruous with the man who'd chatted him up in a bar and recruited him to a corporate black ops team. Daniel was convinced at some point that the endless chatter and convoluted stories were a cover for the ruthless operative that made up the core of Warren's personality, but he learned quickly that it's actually his _default state_.

Still, he has a whole bunch of different kinds of silences, starting at 'comfortable' and hitting every stop on the way to 'literally about to eviscerate someone'. Dealing with those silences was an occupational hazard for the other two members of the SI-5. Kepler telling you what he wants is easy to understand-- Kepler staring silently with a neutral expression on his face usually means something unspeakably awful is about to happen. 

It's not the first time Kepler's looked a million miles away, arms crossed behind his head and eyes fixed on some crack the ceiling, the bedside lamp dimmed to its lowest setting. It _is_ the first time Daniel's in bed with him while he's doing it and the first time he even thinks about interrupting. "'S on your mind?" he asks when the silence gets a little too deafening, and he sits up, folds his legs under.

"Nothing."

"We _both_ know you can come up with a better lie than that." Daniel doesn't flinch away from the annoyed furrow of Kepler's brows, but he does dial back his tone. "C'mon," he says, knocking twice on his chest. _Open up._ "Warren. Talk to me."

Kepler takes a long moment to consider his words, but his gaze is closer, fixed on Jacobi now instead of on some point lightyears away, so Daniel waits. "We picked up the letters from Lovelace's first rotation on the Hephaestus," he says, finally, decisive and blunt.

"And?"

"That's what's on my mind."

Kepler seems proud that he'd managed to articulate his thoughts into something so concise, and Daniel almost feels bad for pushing further. "Like," he suggests, "what you'd put in a letter?"

"Losing my crew." 

_Ah._ No wonder he didn't want to bring it up. Jacobi's pretty sure that he should feel at least a little guilty about the betrayal (The Betrayal)-- Kepler losing Maxwell to a bullet in her head and then Jacobi to a change of heart-- but the colonel's had that coming for a long time, from numerous sources, so Jacobi can't muster anything but a vague sense of pride that he'd managed to pull one over on _Warren Kepler_. He has the impression that Warren respects him more for it. "Yeah," he says, "that'll do it."

Stretching his arms out to either side, Kepler doesn't bother fighting back a yawn as he settles in again, languid and boneless. "What would you have written?" he asks, and while the curiosity isn't new, the impulse to humor and cajole Jacobi into talking _more_ is a pretty recent development. 

It's not exactly Daniel's favorite conversation topic, but he mulls the question over and comes to a bit of a sad conclusion: "Nothing, probably." Everyone he even remotely gave a shit about was on the Hephaestus with him. The rest of his co-workers would move on. "I didn't have anyone to come back to on Earth. What do you think Maxwell would write?"

"Instructions for AI maintenance and upgrades." That answer comes a little too quickly, and Kepler meets Daniel's skeptical look with a wry smile of his own. "She typed one up before every field assignment and periodically updated the manuals. Honestly, she thinks she's in the same boat you are. No one but us and the AIs to miss her."

Of course he'd know that, and as much as Daniel hates the idea of it, he's not _wrong_. Maxwell alienated her co-workers even at Goddard, less patience reserved for fellow AI developers who should _know better_ and more for the SI-5, who she doesn't expect to know _anything_ about AIs but who always manages to get the job done. Her co-workers didn't dislike her, but they certainly didn't bother trying to get close. "What about you?" Daniel asks, pushing that thought aside. Maxwell's back; she's with her team, one that can really appreciate her patience, her quick thinking, her ambition, and her ability to render a target into pink mist from two miles away.

"I like to think," Kepler says, "that I'd have said and done everything I needed to before it came to that." He holds Jacobi's gaze for a few seconds more, then impatiently gestures at him to get under the covers. 

Jacobi does, trying not to think too hard about the arm Warren immediately curls around his waist or the strength of it as he's pulled flush to his chest. There was a time when seeing Kepler so much as yawn was a treat, a tiny reminder that under the operative there was a man, and Daniel could glimpse him but he'd never reach him. He's seen Warren bleed, but even the most traumatic of injuries (read: losing a hand) was treated like a minor setback. The hints of humanity only emphasized every other moment of Kepler's life: deadly, cold, untouchable. 

Jacobi knows that he'd have to be an idiot to think that Kepler's any less dangerous just because he's actually answering his questions instead of stonewalling him, just because he's letting Daniel kiss him and call him Warren. 

Just because he's turning out the light and leaving a toothpaste-scented kiss at the corner of Daniel's mouth before settling in behind him.

No, Daniel would have to be an idiot of cosmic proportions to think that the alien clone of his corporate black ops ex-boss who he's been carrying a flame for for six years is suddenly _harmless_. Still, he's never been afraid of Kepler the way most people should be, hyper-aware of when to push and when to submit (working with explosives gives one a good sense of when to back down), so he turns over and grins at the contented sound Warren makes when Jacobi rests his head against his shoulder. 

"Plans for tomorrow?" Daniel whispers into the dark.

"Stock up the fridge."

"Recon on Trader Joe's first thing in the morning," Daniel says, and the answering huff of laughter from Kepler, the brush of lips against his temple, punches the air right out of his lungs. "Copy that."

* * *

"I thought it was stock-up-the-fridge day," Daniel groans at 0800, blearily watching Kepler pull on a light gray suit jacket over the rest of his business ensemble. It's not a bad sight to wake up to; Colonel Kepler is a man who knows what looks good on him (which, if Daniel were being honest about the cut of his jaw and the expressive, soft pout of his lips, is just about goddamn everything). Daniel had been hoping to see more of the familiar chest-hugging henleys and fitted jeans after so many months of Goddard-issue paramilitary uniforms and shapeless flight suits but, he decides, watching Kepler adjust his tie and check his reflection in a mirror, this is fine. "You really gotta get all dressed up for Whole Foods?"

Turning to look at him, arms wide, Warren waits on a brief thumbs-up of approval before he pivots back to his dresser and swipes his keys off it. "It's you-and-Maxwell-stock-up-the-fridge day," he says. "Already sent the list."

Oh, yes. The List. Daniel digs his phone out from under his pillow and checks his messages as he sits up, scanning the list while he scrubs the sleep out of his eyes. As usual, it details preferred brands and approximate quantities and cost. Kepler had added Daniel's favorite brands of chips, razors and shampoo, things he had only ever mentioned once or twice in passing, which means there's hardly a need for him to accompany Maxwell. "Can I go with you instead?" he asks. "Watch your back, and all?"

The flash of surprise on Kepler's face lasts for a fraction of a second, rapidly turning into a small, indulgent smile. "You'll be bored," he says, "but I appreciate the thought."

"I won't be bored," Daniel insists, already climbing out of bed and shuffling to Kepler's closet to search through it. A few months ago he would think very, very carefully about arguing with Kepler but lately he's been feeling out the boundaries of Warren-as-a-friend and also Warren-in-a-relationship and the leeway he gives in those roles is much more generous than he gave to Jacobi-as-a-subordinate. 

"You can wait in the car," Warren concedes. 

Daniel ambles to the bathroom with an armful of clothes, veering briefly toward Kepler to bump shoulders on his way to the shower. Warren leaves the room to join Maxwell and Lovelace in the living area, the former in a tank-top and jeans with its cuffs rolled halfway up her calves, and the latter in a sleeveless tee with over-sized armholes that Warren remembers wearing often when he first moved to Florida. Lovelace has also found a pair of swim trunks that function nicely as shorts. 

"All three of you," he says in greeting, including an oblivious Jacobi in his observation, "should probably buy some clothes." He's made a point of generosity throughout his personal and professional life, but the thought of even his team rifling through his belongings is uncomfortable at best. Generous, Maxwell had once pointed out, but territorial. He hadn't bothered trying to dispute it. 

"But this is so comfy," Lovelace drawls, looking tired, but she grins up at him from the couch. Both women seem perfectly at ease in his clothes, which could signal more appropriation of his wardrobe, something Warren finds himself simultaneously balking and preening at. He's always had good taste. 

"Honestly," Maxwell agrees, turning her big, dark eyes on him, "all of your stuff feels way nicer than mine."

While he'd always regarded Maxwell as a near-ideal operative, Warren hasn't had much reason to familiarize himself with Maxwell's civilian wardrobe, and he grimaces at her words. "Feel free to pick out a few things to keep," he concedes after a second, unwilling to deprive her of _comfortable clothes_ , "but something you'd wear in public might also be useful."

"Yes sir," Maxwell says, and Lovelace gives him a cheeky two-finger salute.

"Jacobi's with me today, so Captain...?"

"Sure, I'll pick up supplies with Maxwell." 

"I also have a question for you two," he continues, painstakingly professional. "I know Goddard suppresses hormone cycles for astronauts as needed with a monthly pill, but it's proprietary medication and we don't have access to it. If you've got any other prescriptions, I know some doctors outside of Goddard's scope who can write them."

Lovelace gives Maxwell an incredulous look, hoping for something other than the nonchalant shrug she gets in response. 

"I'm good," Maxwell tells him, thankful for how un-awkward he's made a fundamentally awkward question. Must be rehearsed. "I wasn't on anything before, and I don't plan to need any kind of birth control. Will let you know if that changes."

Lovelace waves away the offer as well, but doesn't bother to elaborate. "Uh, same, I guess." To Maxwell: "Gonna miss it, though."

"I know. _So_ convenient."

"Honestly," Lovelace muses, "the fact that it's not already on the market is kind of messed up. You know how many people would _kill_ to have birth control pills you only need to take once a month and that have basically no side effects?"

"It does sometimes raise blood pressure," Maxwell agrees, "but compared to everything else that's available, it really should be more accessible. Sir, do you know why--?"

"Still trying to get it through the FDA, as far as I know." He wasn't tapped into _every_ aspect of Goddard's operations, but Kepler'd made it a point to familiarize himself with the supplies they brought to space-- especially the ones produced in-house. "They were officially halfway through the third phase of testing when we went up to the Hephaestus, so I'd say it's... about two years out from hitting the market?"

"He just knows that off the top of his head?" Lovelace whispers to Maxwell.

"Handy, right?"

"Debrief at 1900 tonight," Kepler tells them, ignoring the comment as he makes his way to the kitchen.

* * *

Halloway Industries' corporate building is barely a mile away from Goddard HQ, a smaller, less contemporary collection of office spaces shared with an accounting firm on the second floor. Its factories and labs are scattered all across the state rather than concentrated in a centralized campus, but Kepler pulls up into a parking space just outside the lot and reaches into the SUV's glove compartment for a folder. 

"Halloway?" Jacobi asks, almost entirely rhetorically. 

Nodding once, Kepler moves on to checking his pockets for his wallet, then opening the driver-side door and setting one foot on the pavement. "You want to keep the AC on?" he asks, hesitating for a second before he decides to leave the keys in the ignition regardless. "Snacks," he continues, dropping a protein bar into Jacobi's lap, then a bottle of water. "Drinks. Phone charger in case it takes a little longer than expected."

"And the sign telling good samaritans not to break the window 'cause I've got air conditioning and water is under my seat, yeah." Daniel grins. "Got it."

Kepler rolls his eyes, but he leans into Jacobi's space to steal a kiss. "Don't be so dramatic," he says, and pulling away, "I'll be right back."

He barely hears the indignant ' _You're_ calling _me_ dramatic?!' from Jacobi as he shuts the door.

* * *

Kepler slips into the building with a frazzled-looking accountant and lifts an ID card off a man heading out for lunch who's just similar enough to him in facial features to avoid setting off any alarms. The elevator he takes with a group of office ladies eventually stops on the 23rd floor, and he steps off with one of them, veering away from the group to make his way to a glass-walled office brimming with natural light, a rather large mahogany desk set in the center.

The woman behind the desk tracks him in her periphery when he lets himself in, having charmed his way past the secretary, and grimaces as he approaches the desk. She'd made a good show of pretending she didn't notice him, signing a form with one hand with the other conspicuously hidden under the desk. "Warren Kepler," she says. 

"Lucy Hsieh." Kepler raises one hand, palm forward to show that he's unarmed, and grins when she sighs and lets go of whatever weapon she was preparing to turn on him from under the desk. "Wait," he says, half-laughing as he glances over his shoulder, "you're going by... Jenny Mendel now? Bold. I like it. I couldn't get a proper appointment so I thought I'd surprise you."

"I thought," Hsieh forces through clenched teeth, "you burned the Hawking identity years ago. When I burned it for you. In Daegu."

"Well, that's why I thought it'd jog your memory and you'd make space in your schedule for me." Kepler gives her a smile with all his teeth, absolutely no change in his tone or his bearing. Aggressive Normalcy Chicken is won by whomever can maintain their calm longest, after all. "How've you been?"

Clearly familiar with this game, Hsieh sighs and puts down the pen she'd been trying to snap in half with the power of her grip alone. Given that it's an engraved fountain pen gifted to her for her most recent promotion, it holds up pretty well. "Not bad," she answers. Kepler's probably not _unarmed_ but his hands aren't anywhere near where one can store a holster and all he's got within reach is a single folder tucked under his arm.

"Corner office," Warren comments, making a brief round through the place, stopping by one particular shelf to adjust a snowglobe a quarter-turn clockwise to properly face the rest of the office. "You _have_ been doing well for yourself." 

"You getting any closer to that fat Goddard pension I've heard so much about?"

"Free agent, actually. You're in Legal?"

 _That_ gets her attention. Hsieh stands up, steps around her desk and leans against the front of it to watch him continue prowling through her office. "Logistics. Bit more my speed, if you'll recall."

"Oh, I do."

"What're you here for, Kepler?"

Kepler picks a letter-opener off her desk, idly flipping it in his hand as he talks and continues pacing. He throws it up by its pointy tip, then catches it by the handle. Handle, tip. Tip, handle. "You remember Belarus?" he says.

Hsieh frowns. "Are we collecting for Belarus?"

"We're collecting for Belarus." Belarus was a bit of an embarrassment for both of them, moreso Hsieh than Kepler. As intelligence operatives from competing companies, Kepler had the power and clout of Goddard behind him; Hsieh did well with her limited resources, but only ever outmaneuvered him a handful of times before she transferred to a different department within Halloway.

"Alright, shoot." Her shoulders slump and she flaps a hand at him, grimacing. Belarus was the operation where he could probably have gotten her killed and decided instead to share a hard-won piece of intel that ended up benefitting both Goddard and Halloway, earning her a sizable bonus that year before she was promoted to head of Logistics. "Throw whatever unreasonable demand you got at me."

Finally done convincing a former rival that he's not here to finish the job, Kepler grins. "In about two months," he says, using the letter opener to gesture now, "Goddard Futuristics is gonna receive some news that will flip the company on its head. You'd be in a very good position to take on a few projects that would make Halloway Industries look... well, better, after the self-driving car fiasco."

"Which projects are we talking?"

"Global internet access. That's closest to what you do here."

"I know for a fact that program costs Goddard tens of millions a year in upkeep," Hsieh tells him.

"Made up for by the bump in revenue from good PR and socially-conscious new clientele."

"You're telling me I have to spend millions to finally make sure I never have to see you again?"

"Again, that you'll make back from the abundance of customers in affected areas who are now incentivized to buy a new phone. The infrastructure's already in place, that cost Goddard more than maintenance and expansion put together." Smirking, Kepler places the letter opener back on her desk and leans over it. "Besides... you'd miss me."

Hsieh's eyes narrow in a way that says she definitely won't miss him. "We can't force them to pick one phone over another. All the ways to do that... are _illegal_."

"I'm not saying to throttle any connections," he answers smoothly. "I'm saying that right now it'll cost you, but in a few years, once phones start wearing out and the people need replacements? They'll be a whole lot likelier to pick one manufactured by the company providing them with free internet, whose logo they see every day. Whose brand comes with a reputation for reliability and service. Whose phones get priority in the freely-provided local network. Why do you think Goddard invested so much in this project in the first place?" 

"Okay, sweet-talker. You throw a nice pitch, but I need some numbers to back that up."

"There isn't a number can be attached to the value of its potential," he says, approaching her slowly, "but the logistics team did the calculations a while back and there's a nice little estimate in this folder here."

She sighs, taking his offering and flipping it open to read. "You always did like potential."

"Well," he says, watching her eyes widen at the figure printed on the document, "I saw yours."

"What news are we talking here, anyway?"

 _Gotcha_. Compared to convincing Minkowski to do the smart thing instead of the crazy and stubborn thing, this is cake. "I can't tell you that."

"I'll bend the CEO's ear and have the team start drafting an offer." Hsieh shakes the hand he extends to her, only briefly hesitating before she clasps the prosthetic and pumps it. She was always good at minding her own business. "We'll wait on your signal. You better be right about this."

"I'll be in touch." He leaves her office with an insolent little wave. "Things change, you'll be the first to know."


	13. Chapter 13

Jacobi's browsing his phone when Kepler returns, and he cranks his seat back upright as Warren slides behind the wheel. "How'd your meeting go?" he asks, passing Kepler a half-empty bottle of water.

"Well," Kepler answers, draining the bottle and screwing the lid back on. He drops it into the cup holder and starts the car, taking a moment to loosen his tie and undo the top two buttons of his shirt. "Gonna find out if Halloway can take over free internet services to underdeveloped regions."

"What happened?"

"The usual." Meaning he twisted some arms and cashed in some favors. Despite his _ability_ to improvise and take over an operation, Kepler has always preferred to delegate. "I made an offer they couldn't refuse."

"That was a _very_ expensive initiative," Jacobi comments.

"Halloway's poised to take over as the second-largest tech conglomerate after Goddard," Kepler points out, "so I don't think they'll reject all that good PR falling into their lap." He sticks his head out the window and cranes his head, scanning the street and the building before retreating back into the car and rolling up the windows. It's still early enough in the day that Canaveral's heat and humidity aren't at oppressive levels, but he cranks up the air conditioning anyway.

Daniel watches him settle in-- re-checking the mirrors, adjusting his seat. The relaxed pace means he's accomplished what he wants and can take a moment to decompress, though he'll never admit to having been stressed at all. Grinning, Jacobi extends the phone charger before Kepler can reach for it. "This is the kinda thing you did on those four-day trips to nowhere, huh?"

"Mm." Kepler makes a point of brushing his fingers across Jacobi's knuckles when he takes the cable, cool silicone moving delicately across his skin. "Boring stuff."

"You never took me on those."

"I don't need a ballistics expert to threaten some lawyers."

"Yeah, but imagine how much easier it'd be if you had one." Daniel kicks his feet up on the dashboard, snickering when Kepler reaches over to smack them back off. "Where to now? More meetings?"

"Bank," says Kepler, exasperated but smiling as he pulls out of their parking spot and takes them around the corner, "then we've got some shopping of our own to do."

"Shopping."

"We-ell, since the three of you have commandeered my wardrobe..."

Jacobi looks away, slumping against the door with a muffled grumble. "I was gonna restock my closet _eventually_ ," he says, eyes drifting to the landscape outside his window. Their first day back on earth, they'd trudged through a forest, their second day they'd strolled through New York. Since then Jacobi's refamiliarized himself with suburbs and highways and birds and _endless_ trees. The ocean view from Kepler's apartment is nice enough, but he's taking the scenic route for a _reason_ , both of them starved for the familiar sight of waves breaking on the shore. "I gotta pick up swim trunks again, too."

"So let's do it today." Glancing at Daniel when he rolls his window down, Kepler takes a moment to inhale the briny ocean scent pouring into the car. He regards the younger man's distant expression, the slight hunch of his shoulders and the way his arms cross in front of him. "You good," he says softly, reaching over to brush Jacobi's elbow with the back of his prosthetic hand before he returns it to the center console between them, "Daniel?"

"Yeah," Jacobi answers, "all good."

Kepler keeps his eyes on the road, silent for a few long seconds before he exhales, returning his right hand to the wheel and idly flexing his fingers. "Alright."

* * *

"We should get the ice cream last," Lovelace says, bent over her phone as she squints at the list. 'Two pints Chunky Monkey' sits under '1 pack Clif Bars' and above 'pack of razors', an indulgent entry in a section that's otherwise almost completely utilitarian. The List isn't explicitly sorted by person, but Lovelace has spent enough time around the SI-5 team to recognize Jacobi and Maxwell's additions, with her own in a cluster at the bottom, newly added.

"Less time to melt," Maxwell agrees. "And the colonel hates it when you let his Chunky Monkey melt. It's usually one pint, though."

"One's for me," Lovelace says, and she meets the grin Maxwell turns on her with a raised brow. Not for the first time, she's both annoyed at the similarity and more secure in the knowledge that despite everything he's done, Kepler's internal logic is sound. It takes a rational man to like Chunky Monkey, and a smart one to put an extra pint on the list to prevent infighting.

"The layout of this place isn't the most intuitive," says Maxwell, returning her phone to her pocket, "but I've been here a few times, it shouldn't be too bad."

"I'm sure there's a couple things that aren't on the list that we'll want, too. Just have to see it to know."

"Not usually, but since this is your first time, that's probably the case." Maxwell plucks two sets of towels off a pile of them and drops them in the cart, murmuring into the comm device still clipped to her collar as she does. Vic pings both their phones, removing 'towels' from The List. "Things will go smoother after a few more supply runs," she says.

Lovelace hauls a box of detergent off the shelf and plunks it into the cart. "What's that supposed to mean?"

"Oh, just that the colonel will get a feel for what you like, what brands, what snacks." 'Laundry detergent' and 'garbage bags' disappear from ths list as Maxwell loads up the cart. She lightly touches the device, checking on the audio and visual feeds before dunking a box of protein bars behind the trash bags. "He itemizes all the receipts, takes inventory, and then incorporates it into the next list. It's very... methodical."

"Don't like that one bit," Lovelace comments. One of her strengths has always been the ability to slip under others' awareness, unobtrusively accomplishing a task before anyone notices that she's done it. It had served her well on the Hephaestus, the first rotation and also when she was revived and in a position to bail Eiffel out of a hostage situation. It occurs to her that Kepler, not one to make the same mistake twice, is well aware of her every move now. 

Maxwell lets out an amused huff and leans on the shopping cart's handle, one foot propped up on the basket underneath. "It's kind of nice," she says.

They pass the freezer aisle without exchanging a word, delving into the dry goods and various condiments area at a leisurely tempo. "This have something to do with the restraining order you have on your family?" Lovelace asks, aware that it's a touchy subject but not particularly inclined to be sensitive toward any of the SI-5. They don't seem the type to take it personally, anyway.

Her question pays off, because Maxwell shows no sign of being bothered. "Well," she says with a wry, dry smile, "I didn't see this kind of attention to detail from _them_."

"Where're you from?"

"Montana."

"Oh," says Lovelace, simultaneously horrified and apologetic. "I'm sorry."

"I like to think it made me a better student." Maxwell's credentials make blunt honesty sound like a brag, but while Lovelace regarded her even on the Hephaestus as a formidable threat, she'd never seemed particularly _threatened_. "Graduated high school when I was 16 and went straight to MIT. I think I could've gotten out sooner, but it took a while for my parents to come around to the idea. They were pretty mad when I dropped off the map completely the moment I was eighteen."

"Like, when you want to get out of a place _that_ badly..."

"Yeah."

Lovelace grimaces. "Can't relate."

"That's New York privilege," Maxwell tells her as she drops a pack of AAA batteries into the basket, pushing it ahead again while Lovelace half-scales a rack to pull down a box of extension cords a few inches out of her reach. She could've just asked Alana to grab it for her, but Maxwell's always been under the impression that Captain Isabel Lovelace is not in the habit of delegating, so she makes room in the cart instead.

"You bet it is," Lovelace quips, setting her haul on top of the towels with a playful spin and flourish. She looks up to meet Maxwell's serious, inquisitive look with one of her own.

"I always wondered what it would be like to grow up there," says Maxwell, nudging the cart forward a bit and prompting the captain to follow. Privately, she considers that she's never seen Lovelace this relaxed before. Kepler had made sure that the SI-5 slogged through every Hephaestus-related transmission from both missions, and the Captain Lovelace of that time-- mischievous and clever-- had seemed a stranger to the obsessive, shrewd captain who'd met them in orbit around Wolf 359. "You know, that kind of... anonymity."

"More like total apathy," Lovelace says with a soft laugh. With that many people in one place, people learned to mind their own businesses; when the Naked Cowboy is a part of your daily commute, some scientist clutching a tablet wouldn't even warrant a second glance. "I mean," she clarifies, "I always considered myself lucky that I did, but if I were a hunting or hiking enthusiast or something, I might've liked Montana."

They turn into the produce aisle, Lovelace reaching for a box of strawberries and Maxwell for a little mesh bag of garlic. "Well," Maxwell says, "our closest supermarket was an hour away, so I'd take this any day."

* * *

Jacobi had assumed it was a joke when they strolled into a PacSun and Kepler immediately picked out a sleeveless graphic tee featuring Godzilla with a surfboard under its arm and flashing a 'hang loose' gesture, but then he'd picked out several more equally ridiculous articles and paid for all of them with his card at the counter. "For the good captain," he'd said, and Daniel had no choice but to conclude that whatever contentious friendship he'd managed to strike up with Lovelace, it involves forcing each other to wear silly t-shirts. 

In the meantime, Warren's accrued a pair of aviators for himself and a new wallet, the former perched on top of his head and the latter stocked with various fake documents he'd picked up from a safe deposit box at the bank. He'd given Jacobi his IDs and bank and credit cards then as well, stowing a packet that was clearly marked for Maxwell in the glove compartment of the car.

Corporate intelligence being what it is, Jacobi's seen Kepler slip effortlessly into such unexpected personas as 'sleazy car salesman' and 'nosy photographer for the local paper' and 'nondescript Fedex delivery guy' on top of more on-brand security guard/military officer/corporate lawyer identities.

He's not even that good at it, is the thing. 

The man fluently speaks half a dozen languages, can put on any accent, any gait, but with that impressive height, an equally impressive build, that _face_ and those unsettling eyes, he has a hard time being forgettable anywhere. 

The best of the colonel's covers are ones where he barely has to act at all, holding court at the center of a crowd of aptly-listening admirers, and even when the disguise is a little flimsy, he gets by on sheer confidence. It probably doesn't hurt that he's charismatic and over-prepared for any potential interaction with a person of interest, and experienced enough to adapt on the fly. Daniel's seen Kepler be _dozens_ of different people.

Warren Kepler, Doting Boyfriend, is a fantasy that Daniel has more than once _imagined_ but considered too unrealistic to truly indulge in.

"Done over here," he says, brandishing a small stack of t-shirts and jeans. Daniel had assumed that Kepler would bulk up his own closet in order to make up what the team's claimed from him, but he'd gone right on ahead and started shopping for Maxwell, which is just as well because Maxwell doesn't like to shop nor spend her own money. 

Daniel stands from where he's crouched in front of a small mountain of shoeboxes. "What's Ma-- uh, Ada's shoe size again?" he calls out, peering over the shelf.

"Seven and a half."

Selecting a pair of white sneakers, Daniel tucks the box under his arm and trails Kepler to the cashier. He'd picked up a pair of sandals for himself earlier, along with another bag of clothes. Kepler hasn't complained specifically about Daniel raiding his closet, but he's about two sizes too large and unlikely to take well to anyone altering his clothes. 

Kepler barely looks over as Daniel joins him on the line, but he shifts his weight onto one foot, making space and leaning briefly into Jacobi's shoulder. He lowers his arm when Daniel peers over it, regarding the clothes he'd picked for Maxwell. Compared to his choices for Lovelace, it's... thoughtful. Comfortable material, a decent fit, practical but flattering. Exactly what Maxwell would choose for herself if she had the patience to spend time at the mall instead of just ordering her clothes online.

"You didn't remember her age," Daniel murmurs, "but you remember her sizes?"

"Shoe size could've been relevant to mission success," Kepler says coolly, and he flashes Jacobi a smirk at his groan. Jacobi and Maxwell have had numerous covers of various ages, but their shoe sizes don't change. "Besides," he drawls, "we see her every day. How could you _not_ know her sizes?"

* * *

"Here," says Kepler as he shoulders the apartment doors open and tosses a flat package onto the coffee table in front of Lovelace. Maxwell, also sitting on the couch, gets one of her own dropped in her lap, and Jacobi sets two large paper shopping bags on the floor beside them. "Presents."

"Wow," Lovelace comments, picking up the bag closer to her, "you two went all out, huh?"

"Oh! I was wondering when we'd see these. Jacobi--?"

Daniel flashes an expertly forged passport and license. He'd gone over it carefully looking for faults, but part of him is sure that if he were to look in a federal database, he'd find official passports linked to Nick Franklin and Ada Vaughan. Kepler had contacts _everywhere_. "Got mine too."

Lovelace tears open the package first, dumping out a passport, a driver's license, and a credit card printed with the name 'Alicia Jemison', all pictures included of a woman who passably resembles her. It makes sense that Kepler couldn't secure her a whole lived-in identity as he did for his subordinates, but he could've done worse. She stows the IDs in her pocket to peruse later, more eagerly digging into the shopping bag on her lap. 

Turning up a few tank tops and sleeveless t-shirts, Lovelace fixes a wary eye on Kepler. "Should I be weirded out that you know my style?" she asks, brandishing a pair each of cargo and board shorts. A pair of men's skinny jeans, a belt. Timberlands. Maybe she shouldn't be surprised; he _had_ spent a few years living in Manhattan, and he's terrifyingly perceptive when it counts.

This time, though, he just gives her a skewed grin. "The fact that you dress like a fratboy isn't a secret, Captain."

"Hey," Lovelace snaps, throwing one of the couch cushions at him, easily caught and returned, "shut up!"

"You mean she dresses like you did in college?" Maxwell quips.

Lovelace high-fives her while Kepler ignores them both and heads into his room. "If our sizes were closer," she says in a conspiratorial whisper, "I really would just live out of his closet."

"No way," Jacobi cuts in, playfully shoving at her shoulder, "you've got clothes now. Off limits."

"Ooh," Lovelace laughs, "Jacobi's territorial now? Okay, defend your man. I get it."

Maxwell scoffs. "He doesn't need defending." 

"Hey," says Kepler from his doorway, already changed into a pair of basketball shorts and a t-shirt, "I'm hitting the gym. Captain?"

Scrambling to her feet, Lovelace takes a second to retie the drawstring of her own shorts. "Yeah," she says, "I'll come with, just gotta grab some socks. Junior nerds?"

"No thanks," says Maxwell, waving away the offer, "we're running in the morning."

"Let's go to the beach after you two wrap up." Jacobi stands as well, extending a hand to pull Maxwell to her feet, a quick trip to the local grocery store for s'mores ingredients and firewood imminent. "You know what I haven't had in _way_ too long?"

"Open flames?" Maxwell sighs.

"Open flames!"

* * *

Lovelace follows Kepler into the building's basement, an old (if well-equipped) gym, taking a moment to appreciate that even though he hadn't lived here in what had to have been years, he'd picked a nice place to live. It probably doesn't hold a candle to Goddard campus employee housing, especially for the company's head of Strategic Intelligence (whatever that means), but he waves her first through the door with a cheery flourish.

There's an elderly woman power-walking on a treadmill but the place is otherwise empty and Lovelace makes a beeline for a rack of dumbbells. She takes two, settling at a bench to watch Kepler strap a thick leather belt around his waist and hook a 20-kilogram weight to it. "Showoff," Isabel accuses when he approaches a pull-up bar and hauls himself easily up. "Do you even lift?"

She waves away the perplexed look he flashes her in the mirror, not interested in explaining the reference, and gets to work on her own. 

They break for a longer rest between sets a half hour later, gathering by the water dispenser. The woman who had been with them earlier is gone by now, though not without stopping to chat with Kepler. Being Kepler, he entertains her for five minutes, charms her apartment number and a promise of baked goods out of her, and volunteers to walk her home (declined, but with a hearty chuckle and a cheek-pinch he'll be feeling for days).

"So," Lovelace asks as he helps himself to a little paper cone, filling it and draining it twice before he turns his attention back to her, "who's this Alicia Jemison?" There's a towel slung across her shoulders, and she uses a corner of it to scrub sweat off her neck, her cheek. "How'd you get her credentials?"

He gives her a smile, sharp and toothy. _Thought you'd never ask._ "Consulted for the military a few years back and assisted with an operation in Colombia," he says. "She's CIA, so when I asked about any spare identities, she sent this over. Needless to say, her name isn't Alicia Jemison." 

"Big problems with the CIA presence in South America," Lovelace comments, nodding, "but thanks for the cover, I guess."

"Jemison doesn't have a background, so come up with something believable and stick with it. Anyone who goes looking will turn up nothing, which is suspicious, so I recommend you don't do anything that might make anyone start looking."

"Copy that."

Kepler chucks out his paper cone and rolls his shoulders, gesturing with a tilt of his head for Lovelace to come spot him on the bench. "Have you spoken to Minkowski?"

"Oh, yeah, Eiffel calls a couple times a day to double-check stuff and she's usually around. Why?"

"Heard from Pryce?"

"Minkowski says she's... still Pryce."

"Pryce is Pryce," Kepler drawls as he snags a bar and heaves it onto the rack, a look of feigned awe on his face. "Wow. Never would've--"

"Oh, shut up! I just mean you can still tell she's her."

"Not like Eiffel?" he suggests.

"No."

"Hm."

"I bet you'd know all about that," Lovelace murmurs, craning her head to see the weights of the plates he slips onto the barbell's shaft and mirroring his selections on her side. She curiously notes that he's dropped the amount of weight from what he'd been lifting on the Sol, and shifts to stand near his head as he lies down and puts his hands on the bar.

"I haven't changed," Kepler says, cracking his neck, taking his time. There's an easy, relaxed pace to him that Lovelace is pretty sure she's never seen before, having only been exposed to the manic forward momentum he'd maintained on the Hephaestus. Even in the brig, she watched him build to something-- waiting, scheming, coiled to seize the next opportunity. She won't complain about his newfound chill, but the inertia is uncharacteristic.

Lovelace keeps her hands lightly on the underside of the bar as Kepler takes it off the rack, gently supporting one side as it begins to drift. "Don't give me that," she scoffs. "Six months ago, you would've killed all of us without a second thought."

"I said," Kepler huffs, tightening his grip as he completes his first rep, "what I said." The second and third come easier, Lovelace letting up on the support as he stabilizes. "The only thing that's changed is the circumstances."

Lovelace internally counts to twelve as he finishes the set, and guides the bar back to the rack as he takes a few seconds to shake out his arms. "You're saying this _whole time_ , you haven't changed your mind about us?"

Sitting up, Kepler leans forward onto his knees as Lovelace crosses her arms. "My impression of you from the start," he says, "was of a clever, resilient commander with an authority problem and a willingness to do what you have to to achieve your objectives. Why... would I need to change my mind?"

"But--" _Goddamnit_ , she should be used to it, but the compliment still takes her off-guard. "I mean, no, but..."

"And Minkowski's always been a capable leader." He hums, stretching out on his back again to start another set. How he manages to talk with only the barest hint of a strain in his voice while benching the equivalent of a Lovelace and a half in weight is a mystery to her, but she lets him keep going. "She likes protocol, but her empathy gets the best of her sometimes. Eiffel hates conflict and has a very loose grasp of the concept of 'work ethic', but his instinct for self-preservation is pretty impressive." 

"That's twelve."

Second set done, Kepler doesn't even bother sitting up this time, inhaling deeply and blinking up at her, brushing his hair back out of his eyes now that he's broken a sweat, the strands sticking to his forehead. "Hera's notoriously rebellious," he continues, "but loyal to people she trusts. Holding the station together as long as she did was an accomplishment in and of itself, so in terms of sheer grit, I think she ranks at or near the top." 

"Hmm. Agreed."

"You're all stubborn," Kepler adds with a lazy grin, "reckless and deeply unlucky, but competence is _possible_ when all that energy's focused. You want me to keep going?" The look on her face says that no, she doesn't want him to keep going, so Kepler shrugs and waits for Lovelace to change the subject. 

"Think that's why Jacobi took our side at the end?" she asks after a few seconds, standing back as he begins his last set.

"I think," Kepler answers, breaks between words longer now, "you're under the profoundly mistaken impression that Jacobi is more like you than he is like me."

"He took our side when it mattered," Lovelace retorts. Kepler scoffs at her words, but he doesn't respond in favor of finishing his workout, a thoughtful look on his face. "He came with us," she adds. "He doesn't _kill_ and _lie to_ people like you do. It actually matters to him."

Much as she'd like to just drop the bar on his head, Lovelace helps Kepler return the barbell to the rack when he finishes his last rep and rolls to his feet. The spotter code prevents her from letting him take two hundred pounds and change to the face, and he politely wipes both the bar and bench before motioning for her to take her turn. He'd also clearly taken the last set to think about his response, but try as he might to stay neutral, Lovelace can hear the note of condescension in his voice as she sits.

"Jacobi flipped," he says slowly, "for exactly the same reasons I did: because there's a bigger picture and he thought his boss had lost sight of it. Frankly, the fact that you even let him out of the brig to help around the station was a risk I would've never taken."

"Uh, what do you mean?"

"You read our files, right?"

"Yeah."

"So you know all about the incident that got Jacobi blackballed from military projects. His work on explosives and sub-orbital ballistics?"

"And?"

"How many people do you think died as a direct result of the things he's designed?" Sub-orbital ballistics were used in almost every branch of the US military, and Jacobi's work was exceptional even then-- precise, easy to mass-produce. "His bodycount made mine look like child's play before we ever met, and if you think for a second either of us have ever forgotten that, you're not as clever as I thought."

"It did?"

"Jacobi's a smart man." There's a look on Kepler's face that Lovelace had seen pretty frequently since Cutter arrived on the Hephaestus, both proud and grim. "Don't assume his crisis of conscience on the Hephaestus had anything to do with people dying rather than _his_ people dying. He wouldn't have lasted in the SI-5 if that were the case."

"It's different. What you do and what he did--"

"And how many people," Kepler says, cutting her off while he takes plates off the bar, "have _you_ killed? You've flown in active warzones. You think it's different because what I do is up close and personal, not to mention more effective, but carpet-bombing villages is fine because you're a few degrees removed? Please."

The worst part is he's not wrong, exactly. Hera's probably the only one of either crew to not have a bodycount, and Lovelace has never shied away from the knowledge that people died because of her and others under her command. Civilians, enemy soldiers, stray dogs, not to mention the crew she couldn't save on the first Hephaestus mission, but she'd never claim to enjoy the work. It's rarely _targeted_ or _personal_. She'd never become a murderer for a _corporation_.

Kepler seems to know exactly what she's thinking because he quirks a brow, challenging her to try her luck and play dumb.

Of _course_ Goddard had its claws in every level of the government. Of course she'd killed for Goddard's interests, she just hadn't known it then. Is that better or worse? "I still can't tell," Lovelace says softly, "if I was right or wrong about you."

"You were right," says Kepler, somehow sympathetic and smug, all at once, "about what would piss me off." He'd always understood the inescapability of Goddard Futuristics, and had decided at some point in his life to cut out the middleman. The realization can't be easy for Lovelace, though, and he steps back once he's done rearranging the weights on the barbell. 

"Hey," she says, "put those back."

"It's better to leave them off," he answers.

Reaching for a 10-pound plate, Lovelace scowls. "I can handle it."

"You shouldn't," he insists.

Hackles raised, Lovelace glares at him. She should be used to his insistence on being listened to without question, but really, he should get used to explaining himself. "Why?"

"There's a Coriolis effect," he says, making a gesture reminiscent of spinning a basketball on his finger, "on the Sol from rotational gravity plus, you know, hurtling through space." He sighs, as if that's something Lovelace should just _know_ without a physics, astronomy or engineering degree. "Your stabilizer muscles are adapted to that, so if you don't want to hurt yourself right off the bat..."

"Okay," she concedes, noting the way tension seems to drain from his shoulders at her agreement. Positive reinforcement works on Kepler, Minkowski had pointed out a few weeks ago. He's probably making the same observations about them. "I hadn't considered that. You learned the hard way, huh?"

"Well," Kepler says, putting his hands on the bar as Lovelace unracks and, predictably, begins to drift, "the Hephaestus mission wasn't my first deep-space rodeo."


	14. Chapter 14

"You missed a spot."

Jacobi looks up, clippers still buzzing in his hand when he meets Kepler's eyes in the bathroom mirror. He's been overdue for a cut, hair usually cropped short to skirt regulations requiring flame-proof shower caps in the Goddard detonation labs, but the convenience factor won out even when that was no longer an issue. 

Warren approaches slowly, a fluid swagger, extending his left hand to rest along the bare skin of Jacobi's spine between his shoulder blades, and he draws it down, counting the vertebrae as they slide under the pad of his thumb. Daniel leans into the touch, shutting off the buzzer before he extends it over his shoulder and prompts the other man to take over. 

Catching Daniel's hand in the prosthetic, Kepler curls his flesh-and-blood fingers along the jut of his hip and he leans in to press a slow kiss to the nape of his neck. He lingers there, eyes shut, breath warm on Daniel's skin, until he finally claims the buzzer, turns it on and steps back. It only takes him a few seconds to clean up the patch that Jacobi'd missed behind his ear, and a diagonal sliver across the back of his skull along an old, thin scar, one long arm radiating from the cluster on his shoulder. 

Once he's done, Warren hands the buzzer back and reaches around Daniel to turn on the shower. There's a little hand vacuum Daniel'd brought in to clean up his clippings, which Kepler takes without comment while Daniel sweeps dark curls off the counter and into the trash with a spare washcloth. They work well together; always have. 

"Had a good workout?" he asks, taking in the damp collar of Warren's shirt, the dark patches where sweat has soaked through the material. 

"Always do," Kepler quips. He's loose-limbed and smiling as he shrugs out of his shirt, balling it up and tossing it onto the pile of dirty laundry in the corner of the bathroom. Daniel tries not to stare when Warren rolls his shoulders; every taut, post-workout muscle in his back flexes with the gesture, and the knowing quirk of his brow tells Daniel that he hadn't succeeded. 

Daniel doesn't have a problem with the way he looks-- his work in Goddard by definition forced him to build his strength and endurance far more than contracting for the military ever did. Even after a rotation in microgravity, weeks of recovering from being shot, just barely dodging an explosion, he'd gotten on The Regimen (which, like The List, is a carefully tailored, strictly enforced routine) and gained back a portion of the muscle mass he'd lost in space. He's picked up a few new scars since, but they're a drop in the bucket compared to the ones he already had.

Daniel's always gotten by on witty remarks, his intelligence, the face of a man who won the genetic lottery and stopped aging at twenty-five. Kepler once remarked that Daniel's job has turned out be thirty percent demolitions expert and seventy percent conman, as you do in corporate black ops. He's never had trouble scoring a number, a date, landing a hook-up, chatting up a target and worming his way into their life. Warren brought him on for his specialty but Daniel earned his place with his adaptability, his willingness to experiment and apply all his various skills in unconventional ways.

He doesn't have a problem with how he looks. 

It's just that standing next to Warren J. Kepler makes a man aware of things he didn't know he should've been. Are gunshot scars _supposed_ to complement your lats?

"Need a shower," Kepler says, snapping him out of it. 

Jacobi's seen Kepler unclothed plenty of times, even before the Hephaestus mission, but back then putting his hands or his mouth on his commanding officer wasn't a possibility so he hadn't let himself consider it. Now, though, he's allowed to blatantly ogle Kepler and all the other man does is shift his stance to give Daniel a better view. "Want some company?" Daniel asks, trying not to make it obvious how dry his mouth has gone. 

"Well, it gets a little crowded in there..."

"Oh, you're right. Guess I'll go check on Maxwell--"

Just when Daniel's about to move out of reach, wondering if Kepler might call his bluff, a finger hooks into his belt loop and jerks him backwards. He's grinning as Warren's arms curl around his waist, the colonel's expression petulant in the mirror as he pulls Daniel flush to his chest. He tenses for a second when Kepler starts nosing at the crook of his neck, but eventually relaxes and tilts his head to accommodate the kiss he delivers to the sensitive skin just below his ear. 

"But," Warren says, low and smooth, "we can make room." 

A year ago, Kepler would've let him walk away. 

Well-- a year ago, they wouldn't be in this position. Jacobi wouldn't try to bluff him but if he did, Kepler would call it and he'd win every time. Right now, Daniel gets to drink in the warmth of Kepler's chest on his back, the heavy, contemplative gaze in the mirror. "'S on your mind?" Daniel whispers, and he matches the lopsided grin on Kepler's face with one of his own.

"Just that I've got this handsome devil in my arms," Warren murmurs against his temple, hands roving down Daniel's stomach to undo the button of his jeans, then the zipper, "and I gotta get him out of his clothes." 

The transition from colleagues to whatever-they-are-now has been pretty seamless too, Kepler making adjustments as easily as if he were turning a dial, or flipping a switch.

The problem with all this, Daniel considers, is that it's exactly what he wants to hear. He groans, half to comment on what a lame retort Kepler had given and half because just the idea of it is enough to make his knees weak. 

That's not a rare occurrence-- Kepler's got a sweet mouth on him and Jacobi's good at figuring out what he wants before he has to ask for it. 'My good right hand' is a given, and he doesn't know _exactly_ how much Daniel likes to hear the words 'Light 'em up, Mr. Jacobi,' and 'Hey, let's try the cheese platter!' but he says them regardless. More recently he'd lie back, Daniel straddling him, and breathe _Look at you_ as they move together. Daniel's chest would constrict around his lungs, Warren's grip digging bruises into his thighs, or his shoulders, or his hips.

Really, for all the times Kepler's an uncompromising, perfectionistic boss from hell, he says and does things just to make Daniel happy _all the time_. Part of keeping his team working like a well-oiled machine, but it sure made not being infatuated with him difficult. Daniel knows better now, anyway: he's long past the point of seeing Kepler as some sort of sadistic croissant where layers of competence pastry alternate with buttery ulterior motives. 

He's just-- Warren. He likes interior design, Daniel Jacobi, pretzels dipped in honey mustard at the mall and YouTube videos of people cooking in rural countrysides. All things Daniel didn't have the opportunity to learn until Goddard Futuristics was out of the picture. 

"I knew you were only in it for my dastardly good looks," Daniel says, squirming out of Kepler's grasp and stepping out of his jeans to duck into the shower. He makes room under the spray of hot water as Warren joins him in the stall. 

"Don't sell yourself short, Sunshine." Kepler laughs, pressing him up against the shower tiles, his mouth on the shell of Daniel's ear, one hand on his neck and the other on his ass, their bodies flush. "I like it when you blow stuff up for me, too."

* * *

"Hey," Jacobi comments as they enter the living room, "she's really wearing it!"

In another life, Warren would point out that it's awfully indiscreet for both of them to leave the bedroom together, freshly changed and showered, but they're not in the field and they're not on company time and Lovelace is wearing the Godzilla shirt he'd brought back for her, so he lets it slide. Lovelace gives him a knowing look, then sticks out her tongue and flashes the same 'hang loose' gesture as the giant lizard on her shirt. "Ready to go?" she asks. "Finally?"

"We've got supplies for s'mores," Maxwell says cheerfully, lifting a reusable shopping bag that she'd turned up in a drawer somewhere, "and hot dogs, buns and firewood."

"Condiments," Lovelace supplies, holding up a handful of little ketchup and mustard packets. "And beer's in the fridge."

Warren steps into his boots by the entrance while Jacobi fetches the drinks, lacing up as Maxwell joins him, and then heaving the bundle of firewood onto his shoulder. He opens the door and steps back, gesturing with a tilt of his head for Alana to go ahead of him. "After you, Doctor."

"Thank you, Colonel."

They turn into the stairwell walking shoulder to shoulder, debriefing on their respective days. Jacobi watches them for a few seconds, then heads out with Lovelace, locking the door behind him. 

If Daniel's _Thing_ with Kepler is their ability to see the joke in every situation, their years of hard-earned trust, Kepler and Maxwell love their professional distance. He calls her Doctor and she calls him Colonel, she gives him a run-down of inventory while dressed in clothes she'd appropriated from his closet and he gives her a status update on parts she'd ordered over a breakfast he cooked her. Maxwell used to hate the way co-workers insisted on friendship, their presumption that they were entitled to her attention, her time, her past. She'd only warmed up to Jacobi when he gave no indication of needing to know anything about her to consider her part of the team. 

With Kepler, the implicit understanding was that he knew everything anyway. Even years into working together, when she'd have happily accepted less formality and more of the affectionate teasing that exists between him and Jacobi, they kept their distance and Maxwell trusted him more for it. 

There was a brief period of time on the Hephaestus when Daniel was convinced that Kepler just didn't give a shit about Maxwell, though to be fair he hadn't been thinking very clearly about it and to be _extra fair_ , Warren hadn't done anything to disabuse him of the notion. Sue him, his best friend had just been shot in the head and his boss, who has always been a stone-cold wall of competence, wasn't having any sort of human reaction about it.

Really, given the loudness of every other aspect of his personality, how was Daniel supposed to know how goddamn _quiet_ Kepler's grief could be?

Well, Daniel decides as he and Lovelace catch up, not just grief. 

He doesn't have much occasion to indicate it, but Kepler likes Maxwell as much as he's capable of liking anyone. They walk in step with each other, Warren slowing his much longer stride to exactly match Maxwell's pace, the latter with her head bent over her phone. She doesn't look up once, trusting Kepler to navigate her around trashcans, telephone poles and palm trees with gentle nudges and pulls, like they sometimes do in the field when Maxwell has to work while moving very quickly. 

He throws out an arm to stop her from walking into oncoming traffic as they cross the street for the beach, and chooses a spot that's far away enough from other beach-goers to be private but not so far as to be completely out of sight. He drops the firewood, slicing through the twine bundling them with a pocketknife, then backs off so Jacobi can work his magic. 

Lovelace pulls Kepler away after a second, both of them hauling a log of driftwood over to serve as seating. Warren joins Jacobi again as Lovelace plops onto the sand next to Maxwell, the two of them immediately unloading the bags of groceries. 

It takes very little time for Jacobi to get the fire going, helped along with something he'd taken out of his pocket to act as kindling and something else he'd poured over the logs as an accelerant. Setting his back against the driftwood, Kepler stretches his arm and casually rests it across the log, behind Jacobi's shoulders. Daniel slouches lower, leans into his side, and takes the s'more Kepler hands him.

* * *

"So if Hera is a mother program," says Lovelace, two-thirds of the way into her second beer, a hotdog in one hand and a stick with which to poke at the fire in the other, "and Vic is a child program, what's a father program look like?"

Maxwell opens her mouth to reply, but Jacobi cuts her off. "Mostly just belittles you and makes you feel inadequate," he quips. 

Snorting, Maxwell leans sideways to bump the fist Daniel extends to her. "Wants to control everything and corrupts multiple directories whenever someone tells it no," she adds.

"And," Kepler chimes in with a shrug, "we haven't been able to get one to stick around long enough to find out what else it can do." He doesn't have his arm around Jacobi anymore, having reclaimed it at some point to gesticulate through a long-winded story about an assignment in Yemen, but he rests his hand on Jacobi's knee, squeezing gently. Warren makes a point of not looking over, not drawing attention to the gesture, but he can see the bitter sneer on Jacobi's face evaporate out of his periphery.

They glance expectantly at Lovelace, who puts up both hands, palms out. "Don't look at me," she mutters, "I had a great relationship with _my_ dad."

"That explains a lot," says Jacobi. There's no bite to his voice, distracted as he is by the hand on his leg, and Warren's soft laughter at their impromptu comedy routine. It's been a while since all three of them were on the same wavelength like that. 

"But to actually answer your question," says Maxwell, cheerfully snapping a few graham crackers into smaller, more manageable pieces, "the father programs run data centers that don't require life support. They handle larger-scale computations on the quantum servers, and expend fewer resources in emotional regulation processes. Not every AI is a father, mother or child program, though. Those are special designations."

"That," Lovelace comments, "is so creepy."

"You won't hear any disagreement from me."

Kepler's hand leaves his knee and Daniel pretends not to feel the loss. He watches Kepler lean forward out of his easy lounge to unlace his boots, pull them off and set them aside just outside the ring of light cast by the fire. "Going somewhere?"

"Just taking a walk," Kepler answers, and he rolls up the the legs of his jeans, securing them halfway up his calves. He hauls himself to his feet in one fluid motion, dusting off the seat of his pants and digging his toes into the sand. "Won't go far," he assures them, though the message seems primarily directed at Jacobi.

"Who came up with those special designations, anyway?" Leaning back, her elbows propped up in the sand, Lovelace watches Kepler in her periphery as he moves out of range and melts into the darkness, toward an area of the beach empty of other people and their campfires. They're not in space anymore, but the sight of anyone disappearing into any kind of inky void is still off-putting in a way that Isabel's sure she won't shake for a while yet. At least his silhouette is beginning to blur; one major difference between the vacuum of space and atmospheric distortion. "Pryce?"

"Cutter," Maxwell answers promptly. "Dr. Pryce can be... a little dry, so Cutter was the one with all the really morbid ideas." 

"Oh," Lovelace scoffs, "of course." Jacobi flashes Maxwell a curious look, as if he hadn't been aware that she knew Pryce before the Hephaestus mission. He certainly wasn't in on it, confusion on board the station still fresh in Lovelace's mind. She takes another swig of beer, distastefully brushing sand off her fingertips from where it collected on the bottle. "You think we should've brought Hera and Vic out with us?"

Maxwell shakes her head, then brushes back a chin-length fall of hair over her ear to flash an earpiece. "They can hear and see everything, though I haven't wired up any external speakers for them. If they've got something to add, there's a direct line to me."

"Convenient." 

"Yep," Maxwell says, shuffling around the fire to settle next to Jacobi with her graham cracker pieces. 

He passes her the bag of marshmallows and then a beer, popping the cap with a screwdriver he'd dug out of his pocket earlier. He keeps looking over his shoulder, squinting into the dark as if he might be able to keep an eye on Kepler with infrared vision instead of human sight if he tries hard enough. 

"Just go," Maxwell sighs after a moment, elbowing him. "You're no fun like this."

"Hey," Jacobi retorts, already scrambling to his feet, "I'm a _delight_." He takes off at a pace just a bit faster than Kepler's but not so quick as to look like he's actually in a rush. 

"Those two," Lovelace comments, briefly tipping her bottle at Jacobi's back as he draws out of earshot, "huh?"

"It's nice to see they're not dancing around each other anymore." Cupping her hand over her mouth, Maxwell leans very slightly forward and doesn't bother lowering her volume at all. "If you think they're annoying now, be glad you missed 2014."

"So this is like-- it's really happening? _Recent development?_ "

"Did you want to know if they were sleeping together before the Hephaestus mission?"

Lovelace sucks on her teeth, idly tongueing at a piece of hotdog casing stuck between her molars. "I kinda have ten bucks riding on 'yes'," she says after a moment.

"Ooh, sorry, Captain. They never crossed that line, at least as far as I know."

"That's a little surprising."

"Is it?"

"Considering all the other lines they've crossed," she elaborates. "Lying, murder, manipulation, what's a little fraternization?"

"Well," Maxwell says, a laugh in her voice, "it would've been against company policy, and you know the colonel's all about protocol."

"Okay, point taken."

"Besides," Maxwell points out, "they weren't the only ones who crossed lines. You killed a Jacobi. Minkowski killed a me."

Her tone is more observation than accusation, as if both those incidents have already been filed away as inconsequential. Lovelace had noticed that about the SI-5 not too long after they'd arrived, the way Jacobi and Maxwell would come at each other over things like minimally annoying roommate behavior but seemed to take horrific experiences and threats of physical violence in stride. No wonder they were all messed up in the head. "That's true," Lovelace concedes.

"Knowing what we do now," says Maxwell, "would you have done things differently?"

"For one thing, we didn't know what was out there. For _another thing_ , having an extra one of you SI-5 clowns on the station would've turned out badly for _my_ crew." Lovelace considers the question for another second, but confidently comes to the same conclusion she'd clearly been heading toward. "No, probably not."

"You know," Maxwell quips, "this is why the colonel likes you so much."

"And yet, that doesn't make me happy." More recently, Lovelace has come around to the idea that maybe Kepler genuinely _did_ like them on the Hephaestus (excluding Hilbert), though just liking them would absolutely not have stopped him from wiping them all out if he were ordered to. "You know," she adds, "when you three turned up, I thought it couldn't possibly get worse, but Kepler's almost cuddly next to Cutter and Pryce."

"Warren J. Cuddler?"

"Please don't."

"That's the thing, though. It's good to have him on your side, you just needed to make a _really_ strong case for it." A sigh, and Maxwell rolls her eyes. "Big picture." 

"What about you?"

"What about me?"

"Where do you stand on the big picture?"

"Well, we've got confirmation that there is one, and team alien is sort of integral to it. Beyond that, I'm going to keep working on AIs and doing whatever the team needs from me."

"That simple?"

"That simple." Dusting graham cracker crumbs off her fingers, Maxwell reaches for the packet of hot dogs and busies herself with skewering one up. "Why? What's on your mind?"

Plucking absently at the collar of her shirt, Lovelace squints into the fire. "You're not thinking about, you know, settling down? Getting out of it?"

"Is that what you want?"

"Maybe."

"I think I'd be bored," Maxwell answers, "not to mention a little lonely."

"You never wanted time away from Goddard to have a life? Date someone?"

"My life is my work. I know not everyone gets to make a living doing what they love, so I always felt lucky that I could." Maxwell shuffles forward, extending her frankfurter to toast in the flames. "Did you want to date someone? Oh! Minkowski?"

Lovelace scowls. That's two out of three SI-5 operatives who've implied that she's maybe, possibly, got a crush, on Minkowski, and that's not even including the times Jacobi's meaningfully waggled his eyebrows at her. Not that she'd ever admit it. "Wha--t does Minkowski have to do with this?"

"I mean," Maxwell says innocently, eyes wide, "I just think you two work well together."

"She's dealing with a lot," deflects Lovelace. "Everyone is."

"Yeah." Finally done cooking, Maxwell gestures for Lovelace to throw her the bag of hotdog buns, and deftly catches it when it's sent flying over the fire. "We could all just use a friend right now."

There's a wistful way that she says it, a quick glance toward the direction Jacobi and Kepler had taken off in. Lovelace isn't a stranger to having friends hook up with each other, but it occurs to her that Maxwell's two closest coworkers are _Kepler and Jacobi_ , the three of their lives so entangled with each other's that any change in the dynamic will be acutely felt. "You're kinda feeling like a third wheel, huh?"

"There's always going to be an adjustment period," Maxwell says evenly. "I'm happy for them."

"We kinda noticed on the Hephaestus," Lovelace says slowly, watching for signs that Maxwell might not want to continue this line of questioning, "but have those two always been so... tuned in, I guess, to each other?"

That nets her a thoughtful look, a brief review of the things Lovelace might be able to hold or use against them, but Maxwell finally seems to conclude that it's information that won't have any real application outside of a brief gossip session. "When you spend _that_ much time with someone who's essentially running your life, it's hard to pull back." She focuses on her food again, gingerly squeezing a packet of ketchup in a neat wavy pattern over the hotdog. "I read about codependency when I was doing research for personality matrices, but they both seem to be better about it now."

"You get caught up in that at all?"

"Hard not to. But I think it's fine to rely on people who've statistically proven to be reliable, so it wasn't a problem."

Lovelace raises both her eyebrows. "Statistically proven?"

"Reactions like that," Maxwell points out, "are why people like me end up in the SI-5."

"I was gonna ask if you _felt_ anything about it, but..."

"How am I _supposed_ to feel?" She gives an exaggerated shrug. "Experience tells me that they'll have my back and they'll let me do what I want, within reason, so I want to maintain my membership on this team. I don't like it when they get hurt, and I know they don't like it when I do. I don't really trust _feelings_."

Kepler has (charitably) argued that their instinct is to rely on objectivity and fact; Jacobi had quipped that with their lifestyles, the three of them reasonably perceive _everything_ as a threat and if they acted on _that_ assumption, they might as well lock themselves inside their homes and never come back out. They all make plenty of split-second decisions, not all of them correct, but there'd always be a chain of logic.

Lovelace takes a second to think that over, testing out the idea of being unable to trust her own instincts, and makes a face. "Wow," she says, not unkindly, "I make a good half of my decisions on gut feeling."

"Jacobi once pointed out that it seems like my first reaction in _every_ situation is 'poke it and see what happens'." Taking a bite of her hotdog, Maxwell smiles. It's the private, mischievous one she often shares with her team, some inside joke that Lovelace isn't privy to. "He's not... wrong."

Poke the threat and see what happens. "Isn't that all three of you," Lovelace deadpans. 

"Kepler and Jacobi," she says, very seriously, "are a hundred percent of my impulse control."

* * *

Warren must have seen him coming out of his periphery, because he stops walking, turning in place to watch Daniel catch up. Jacobi, of course, takes his sweet time now, approaching at a leisurely stroll just so he gets to see Warren wait on him. 

"Hey," Daniel says, stepping into the circle of Kepler's Personal Bubble. The KPB's a formerly inviolable space that Warren occasionally invited Daniel into before the Hephaestus mission, but never allowed him to take for himself. It's free game now, without their ranks in the way. 

"Clingy," Warren comments, though he snakes his arm around Daniel's waist and pulls him against his side. 

The KPB's always a warm place to be, not least because Warren just seems to run hot. Maxwell calls him _exothermic_ , and despite (or maybe because of) how much it annoyed Jacobi, would sometimes sit as close to Kepler as humanly possible without actually crawling into his lap just to sap his warmth. Kepler always tolerated it in colder locales, as if Maxwell were an iguana with whom he had an agreement. 

Daniel _will_ admit that he's never had a problem before with losing track of Kepler, the man prone to wandering off on his own to accomplish some objective he didn't tell the rest of the team about. He'd usually warn them when he was about to black out communications, then turn back up at some opportune moment when it seemed like things were about to get FUBAR with some stupid cheeky comment: 'Missed me?' or 'I think it's about time we blew this popsicle stand'. 

"Well," Daniel murmurs, letting his head drop against Warren's shoulder, "the last time I let you out of my sight, you got vented out an airlock." 

"No airlocks here." 

"Can't be too careful."

They digest that for a while, Warren thoughtful and Daniel only slightly embarrassed about showing his hand like that. It's not that he ever _liked_ not knowing where Kepler was, but before this point he couldn't say so. Before this point, he would've been ordered to put it away and get over himself. Now, Warren seems content to let that sit, accepting it as yet another accommodation he'll have to make.

They're both facing the ocean now, the moon lightly obscured by a few wisps of cloud, its reflection splashed across the ripples of distant waves. Existential terror was frequent and acute in orbit around Wolf 359, the sense of being tiny and irrelevant in the vast universe such a daily sensation that it blended right into the background, like stellar radiation. Digging his toes into the sand and faced with an endless yet decidedly finite ocean is an entirely different sort of insignificance.

"You know," Warren says after a few seconds, a contented murmur against Daniel's temple, "it's been documented that sailors who've spent an extended amount of time in a submarine become starved for the natural world. They'd take turns at the periscope just to see the sun, and birds, and waves." 

Black ops agents who've spent an extended amount of time orbiting a star in a tin can become starved for the sight of a moon, and open spaces, and the freakin' _horizon_. "That's you right now?" Daniel asks.

"I'd say," Warren answers, arm tightening briefly around him, "I'm somewhere a little better."

Inhaling sharply, Daniel considers, again, that he must be _crazy_ for how comfortable he is in the KPB. 'Within arm's reach of Warren J. Kepler' isn't usually a place anyone wants to be, and Daniel knows he's read the literature on human psych, that Warren can put up a strong simulacrum of affection. He can rewire his impulses, his perspectives and his approaches in accordance with his objective, and he's apparently decided that making Daniel's stomach do a bunch of little backflips is his objective for the moment. 

Kepler notices, because of course he does, and shifts to fit his chest to Daniel's back, arms looping around him. "You all right?" he asks, his own expression a perfect mask of curiosity. 

"Yeah," Daniel says immediately, "never better." 

It's the rote answer, the one that's expected of him. The only acceptable answer when Kepler asks that question. 

One of the many surprising things Jacobi had learned about Kepler early on: He's always maintained that people's vulnerabilities should be accommodated, factored into every equation, spaces made accessible. For someone whose day-to-day involved exploiting every opening he can create, Kepler's steadfastly egalitarian, firm in the belief that every person should have the chance to live the life they want, so long as they don't get in his way. 

It was only the SI-5 that didn't have the luxury of fear and insecurity, no leeway for mistakes or weakness, not with Goddard Futuristics on the line. Kepler lived in a world where everyone but Warren Kepler was allowed to be a person, and Daniel had done his best to meet him there. 

They're not SI-5 anymore, and whatever else Daniel's trying to find in Warren's expression-- the silent warning, the unspoken demand for Jacobi to _tell him what he wants to hear_ , the layers and layers of implication-- it's not there. Just simple concern, and a brief flash of doubt that smooths over almost instantly. Warren's taken him at his word before and nearly gotten shot for it, he's no doubt aware of and ready for the possibility that Daniel will turn on him again, but at least for the moment, he's letting it go.

It's... dumb. 

It's _trust_ , and Kepler, who prides himself on never making the same mistake twice, is trusting Jacobi to mean what he says like that hasn't come back to bite him once already. He might as well hand Jacobi a knife and bare his neck.

"Actually," Daniel says softly, "alright, something's been bothering me." 

"And," Kepler says, "what would that be?"

Daniel lays his palm over the hands clasped at his navel, turning his head up and murmuring the question into Warren's cheek. "Since when were you ever this sweet to me?"

"I'm not allowed... to be sweet to you?"

Unable to see his face but perfectly capable of hearing the indignant eyebrow-raise in his voice, Daniel huffs and turns around, careful not to break out of Warren's hold when he looks up. For once there's no sarcastic quip ready to roll off his tongue, just the sense of standing in uncharted territory, and the unease that had been gnawing at him for the last week finally taking shape. "It's not like you, is all."

Warren's expression has flattened, a look of shrewd curiosity on his face as both his hands unclasp from the small of Daniel's back to rest on the waistband of his shorts, thumbs hooked casually into the belt loops. He's got his _something's gone wrong and I need to know what it is before I decide who needs to die about it_ face on, familiar in all the ways Daniel has been missing. "Has this been bothering you for a _while_?" he asks.

"I really," Daniel answers, "wasn't expecting any of this."

"What were you expecting?"

"For you to be more... you."

Mulling that over, Warren's shoulders rise and fall in one very visible sigh, a mild stab of disappointment turning down the corners of his lips. It's not surprising; he expects Daniel not to approach him with a problem unless he's got a solution, a course of action to untangle whatever snag is keeping them from their objective. "Everyone," he says, excruciatingly slow, "is a different person in different contexts."

"And this is just you in a new context?"

There's a warning in his next question, something simmering underneath. "What else would it be?"

Jacobi's brows furrow, his jaw clenching. Kepler stopped trying to read him about two years into their partnership, finally trusting that he would speak up if needed, reserving energy for whatever poor sucker had a target on their back that particular assignment. It was flattering at the time, when the pressure of Kepler's scrutiny finally lifted off his back (to turn on Maxwell instead), and Daniel's missing that sorely as Kepler's hands drop back down to his sides.

What else _would_ it be?

"Seriously, Jacobi?" His voice is soft, face shrouded in darkness, but Daniel winces at the tone and he knows Warren caught it. "You tried to _kill me_ because you thought I didn't grieve for Maxwell enough," he says, colder by the second, "because I didn't tell you enough. You were so _goddamn angry_ I wouldn't say in front of _Rachel Young_ that I didn't jibe with Cutter's plan." 

"I know."

"See, being _sad_ about Maxwell wouldn't have returned control of the station to me." The edge Kepler had spent so much time cutting out of his voice is back with a vengeance, jagged and mocking. He narrows his eyes, mouth twisting into a sneer. "Telling you wouldn't have made a difference. Acknowledging that Cutter's plan sucked in front of Young would've _literally_ gotten all of humanity killed." 

"I know," Daniel repeats, and something in his expression or his body language must have changed, because Kepler growls, soft and low, eyes closing briefly before he relaxes his hands, his shoulders. 

"I've kept you in the loop," Warren says, the most tired he's ever sounded, "and _this_ is where you're at?"

"I don't know where I'm at. I--" Daniel cuts himself off, gesturing with his chin toward the flicker of light in the distance that marks the rest of the team, "you know, Maxwell acts like herself, but that guy-- the one I _mourned_ after we left the Hephaestus. That's... not you."

"You hated me for _putting aside_ my emotions to get the job done." There's a crack in Warren's voice between 'the' and 'job'. He seems to register it the same moment Jacobi does, tone flattening. "I'm doing what you asked me to."

"Warren," Jacobi says, and in the three seconds of silence that follow, he can't think of anything to add. Kepler takes a step away, his shoulders square. A door Daniel hadn't realized was open slams shut. 

Kelper schools his expression, smoothing the furrow between his brows and unclenching his jaw. He shrugs, smiling now, the barely-there flash of cool amusement announcing to Jacobi that none of this _actually_ matters to him. A familiar, well-worn defense mechanism. "That's fine," he says, shoving his hands into his pockets. "We'll continue this when you figure out what you want."


	15. Chapter 15

Daniel trails Kepler back to the fire, his feet dragging. Warren rejoins the conversation as easily as if he'd never left it, sitting next to Lovelace in the sand to pull his boots back on as Jacobi settles in next to Maxwell. Alana passes him a square of graham cracker, methodically building another s'more for herself while he crunches into it and resolutely avoids looking at Kepler.

On the other side of the logs, Warren speaks quietly to Lovelace for a few seconds, then stands up and brushes sand off the seat of his pants. "I'm gonna head back," he says to Maxwell, checking his pockets to make sure he hasn't forgotten anything. He waits on a nod to turn on his heel, and takes the walk back to the apartment at a brisk tempo more reminiscent of a trip to Cutter's office with a less-than-stellar mission report than his more recent, leisurely stride.

Lovelace, being Lovelace, pushes herself to her feet and leaves Jacobi and Maxwell wth a brisk 'Later!' She doesn't _mind_ their company, as far as Daniel knows, but the Worthy Rivals routine she and Kepler are so fond of clearly takes precedence. They have some sort of mutual fascination with each other that Daniel can _kind of_ understand; it's definitely not the first time Warren's met someone as ruthless and calculating as himself, though it is probably the first time they're not (actively) trying to kill him.

Being alone with Maxwell usually makes it pretty easy to relax, but Daniel idly rubs his chest over his sternum, unable to shake the tightness around his lungs.

"So," Maxwell says, watching Lovelace's retreating back, "that was weird. What happened?"

"What was weird?" Daniel drags a hand down his face. "Nothing happened." He doesn't meet Maxwell's gaze, still trying to recall the details of the conversation, the look on Warren's face. He'd expected to be dismissed, or for Kepler to come up with a document, some inspiring speech, something to set his unease to rest the way he so easily smooths over every other snag in his life. 

He hadn't expected the most finicky, overbearing man he knows to _disengage_.

"I mean, for the last week, you and Kepler could barely keep your hands off each other, and now he's turning in early?"

Daniel silently curses Maxwell's aptitude for pattern recognition. "I just... said something he didn't like."

"You had a fight?"

"I guess."

"Very enlightening, Daniel. Thank you."

Daniel pulls his knees to his chest and crosses his arms over them, burying his face in his elbows. "Well, what do you want me to say?"

"You could tell me what's going on and we can figure out how to fix it. What did you say? What did _he_ say?"

"It's kinda fuzzy, honestly."

"Oh, Daniel."

"I'm gonna be sick," he groans.

Maxwell rests her hand on the back of his neck, her thumb skimming the line of his hair. She's never been big on physical comfort, not accustomed to grounding him with anything but her words, but the gesture is sweet-- if a little awkward. She makes an inquisitive sound, her weight resting more heavily on the arm she has braced against his shoulder. "That's interesting."

Daniel groans again. "Glad this is so _interesting_ for you."

"I just mean," she says matter-of-factly, "after everything we've been through and everything we've done, this is the thing that gives you a panic attack?"

"It's not a--"

"It kind of is."

In hindsight, he'd felt twice as uneasy on the Hephaestus after those 96 hours on the module. He couldn't sleep, barely had an appetite, and Kepler'd been so busy running the station that their shifts rarely matched, much less took place in the same sector. Warren didn't always do it consciously, but his calm was infectious and Daniel hadn't realized how much he relied on it until he didn't have it. 

"We were _recruited_ because neither of us have that problem," he points out, lowering his head between his knees and breathing hard through his nose. It helps, and Maxwell's chin on his shoulder is a warm, easy weight to bear.

"Sure," says Maxwell, "but we're still people." Where Kepler expected them to be fine so he could focus on more important tasks, Alana was sensitive to changes in the team dynamic. She liked their routines, their inside jokes, the established boundaries, and always noticed when they changed. "Just because you can keep your cool while being shot at," she tells him," it doesn't mean you're good at handling fights with your boyfriend."

That helps even more, Daniel's anxiety over the situation fading into amusement at the sheer absurdity of it. She's right; Warren's not his boss anymore, and maybe he'd come to terms with that faster than Daniel did. "Makes sense," he murmurs, propping his chin on his arms to look sideways at Maxwell. "I'm pretty bad at dealing with stuff like this."

"Clearly," she mutters under her breath, "you're not the only one."

* * *

Kepler's busy uncorking a bottle of whiskey by the time Lovelace catches up to him back in the apartment, a lowball full of ice on the counter in front of him. He barely glances over his shoulder as she shuts the door behind her. "Back so soon, Captain?"

Lovelace is sure sometimes that even just the tone of his voice is meant to be bait, a line he casts out lightly hoping to hook something and drag it to the surface. It's always unnerving, but she ducks into her room and emerges with the letters they'd retrieved. "I've been working on these for a couple days trying to find out where their families are," she tells him, "and haven't been getting anywhere, so... can you help me translate?"

Kepler internally commends her for not relying on free online translation services; most of them are run by Goddard. "You didn't just ask Hera or Vic to do it?" he asks instead.

She sighs, glancing around the apartment. "Well the drawback of having your computers also be people," Lovelace says slowly, "is that they worry about you, and they can judge you, or report your activities..."

Hera and Vic's shells are both in the other apartment, their audio and visual sensors not quite sensitive enough to pick up their topic of conversation or the text of the letters. Being a deeply private person himself, Kepler flashes her a wry, understanding smile. "You don't want Minkowski and Eiffel worrying. Got it."

"As opposed to you, who doesn't give a damn about me."

He sets down his whiskey and motions for her to come to the counter so he can take the letters. He had to have already read them, but a refresher never hurts. "There's at least," he drawls, "a quarter of a damn reserved for you, Captain."

"Charming."

He folds the first letter back up and sets it on a clear space on the counter. "I can't parse this one at all, looks like some sort of creole shorthand Dr. Fourier used for herself, or maybe with a sibling. Maxwell might be able to access Rhea's old records and puzzle it out for you. She's pretty discreet."

"And Hui's?"

"It's addressed to his sisters." Scanning the page, Warren's expression stays carefully blank. "Says he misses them, is sorry he won't be able to see them again, and wishes them good luck with the kids. Second paragraph... is a bit about the crew." A pause, as if Kepler knows how much this part will hurt. "Talented, courageous people he's honored to work with and call friends. Says he wishes he could've introduced Fisher, Selberg, Fourier and you to them."

It's expected, at least. Despite his relentless sarcasm, he'd consistently show Lovelace and the crew enormous respect. Sarcasm wasn't even a concept Hui grew up with, he'd said once, but one he'd enthusiastically embraced over the course of his education. "Go on," says Lovelace.

"There's a reference to his mission logs, which I can pull from my server for you if you want them." He hums, reaches the end of the letter and turns it over just to check that there's nothing on the back as he finishes translating. "He wrote that he loves his work, but that he regrets not having the time to organize the data himself. He was worried for the rest of the crew, but wrote that you'd be able to take care of yourselves. It's very... restrained."

"Hui was a restrained person."

"I remember."

Lovelace stares at the letters as Kepler folds Hui's over Fourier's and pushes them across the counter back to her. "You were there," she says. "Weren't you?"

"We were in range for about fifty days," Kepler answers. He never was one to sugarcoat things, but he looks at her face and seems to register her thoughts before they even fully percolate. "It was too late to save Dr. Hui by then," he says, not gently but not nearly as harshly as he could have, "and in addition to that, the 'you' who was present couldn't have done anything with a transfusion."

"We _did_ do transfusions." There's a distant, pained look on her face. He takes a moment to wonder if it's one she's ever shown Minkowski or Eiffel, or if he's only privy to it because she wouldn't hesitate to take a swing at him if he tried to use it against her. "A few of them. It... I don't know if it was the right thing. Near the end, he asked us to stop trying."

Kepler watches her for a few more seconds, eyes on her hands as she gathers the letters again and anxiously rearranges them. He pulls another tumbler out of the cabinet, tips a few ice cubes out of his glass into it, and pours a shot of whiskey into each. "Want a drink?" he asks, sliding one over without waiting for an answer.

" _God_ , yes."

* * *

"So... is the problem the alien clone thing?" asks Maxwell. She feeds a sliver of wood into the fire and wipes her hands, wringing the hem of her shirt. "Does it bother you that much?"

"I mean, I know the situation." Unlike Maxwell, who'd sooner chew off her own leg than make a statement without supporting evidence, Daniel's instincts usually turn out to be correct. It's what had saved him in Ohio, 2009, some undetectable sound or smell or prickle in the air that prompted him to stay behind cover at the right time even if he couldn't explain it. It's also what had established him in Kepler's confidence. Warren built his perceptiveness from experience; Daniel's just sensitive to the explosive potential of things that break other things. "He's not... acting like himself."

Making a thoughtful sound, Alana settles more comfortably in the sand. "Would you have this problem if you didn't know he was a duplicate?"

"I dunno."

"But," she continues, looking confused, "Daniel, you spent the last few months wearing him down, and now that he's actually talking to you, you're not into it?"

"Like you're not thinking the same thing."

"The same thing," she repeats, brows furrowing in confusion.

"That he's different?" 

Alana frowns. By her measure, Kepler's always been warmer with Jacobi, more willing to indulge him. Outside of work he's easy company, and while they've never had much opportunity to see him outside of work, the rare occasions were fairly consistent. "He hasn't changed," Maxwell says, "at least, not fundamentally. Isn't Kepler's M.O. to do and say exactly what he needs to as the situation calls for it?"

"You're saying Kepler not acting like himself is Kepler acting exactly like himself?"

"If it turned out that we were dead weight tomorrow," Maxwell says, very seriously, "I don't think he'd have any problem at all cutting us loose, or killing us and dumping the bodies. But he's always looked out for us, because we aren't."

"Y'know when he just-- shut down again, I guess, I thought, 'Hey, there he is! Maybe the aliens got it right after all.'"

"That's kind of the problem."

"What?"

"You liked Kepler, director of the SI-5." Alana doesn't look at him, her expression morose as she takes a thin branch from the pile of wood beside her and suspends its tip in the flames until it catches fire. "But it turns out that he's a person, just like the rest of us, and him being with you doesn't make you special anymore."

"That," Daniel comments, "is a messed up way to treat people."

"You said it, not me." She flashes him a smile, bumping their shoulders. "Besides, do you really need _Kepler_ to tell you that you're pretty great?"

"Where'd you learn to sweet talk like that, Threepioh?"

"I learn from the best, Daniel."

"You've been spending too much time around professional bullshitters is what it is," he mutters.

"I mean," Maxwell says quietly, tapping her stick against a flaming log to knock the charred tip off the end, "when you imply that someone who has his exact genetic makeup and all his memories isn't actually him because he's acting a little different in a new context, that stings a little."

Unlike everything she'd said in Kepler's defense, _that_ makes Daniel snap to attention. "Alana," he tells her, "you know I don't mean you. You're exactly the same insensitive android you've always been."

"Thanks," she answers, voice dry, "Daniel, but it still sounds like his feelings are a little hurt."

"Who?"

"Kepler?"

"Kepler's what?"

"Kepler's hurt?"

"Kepler's hurt where?"

"In his feelings?"

"Whose feelings?"

"Daniel!" Alana groans, exasperated.

"Nah, couldn't be. He's got two emotions," Daniel says, ticking the items off on his fingers, "whiskey and competence. Little late in the game to add 'hurt' to the mix!"

"You were the first one to figure out that he'd already changed his mind about Cutter. Isn't that why you tried to talk to him, at the end?" Daniel's never once doubted the depth of Maxwell's affection and respect, which makes the plaintive, disappointed look on her face hit _twice_ as hard. "Now he's doing what you wanted and being a person," she says, "and you don't like that. What if he decides that it's not worth it?"

Daniel sighs. No one can put things in perspective quite the way Kepler can, but Maxwell comes close. 

"I need to get over myself?" he says.

"Yeah," she tells him, forehead thumping against his shoulder, "you kinda do."

* * *

"Jesus. I need to think about something else." Eyeing her glass, Lovelace squints at the light amber color of the drink in it before she takes a cautious sip, expression brightening before she takes a longer, more luxurious drink. She's comfortably sunken into the couch, Kepler in the cushy armchair across from her. Her eyes slip shut, staying that way for a few seconds before she regards Kepler again. "What's been going on with you?" she asks. "You bailed pretty early."

"Didn't feel like sticking around," he says, taking a pointed sip of his own. 

"What happened with Jacobi?"

"Nothing happened with Jacobi."

"I mean, you left early and now you're breaking out the scotch." She lifts her glass just to emphasize the point. "What is this, by the way? It's great."

"Actually, this is a Japanese whiskey." Kepler briefly swirls his glass, eyes on the drink as it washes over the ice. "Suntory's Hakushu 12. They've got a pretty nifty 17-year blended, but I always liked a good single-malt." After a moment, he sighs, pinning Lovelace with a rueful look. "Scotch really only refers to whiskey from Scotland," he says, "like how only Kentucky can claim to make bourbon-- and I've lost you."

"Couldn't find your Balvenie?" Lovelace offers. She idly considers that he must always have known when the crew had tuned him out, he just didn't care, considering how quickly he realized that she'd lost interest in the etymology of whiskey lecture he was preparing to launch into. 

"I was mostly working in Asia when I lived here."

Checking over her shoulder to make sure that no one's about to come through the door, Lovelace makes a face at him. "Seriously, though. What's up with you two?"

"Nothing."

"Bullshit."

Anyone else on the crew would probably cringe at the expression Kepler turns on her, the hostility in his eyes, but Lovelace has seen worse on her daily commute, so she just stares at him until he caves, shoulders slumping. "He's... working through some things."

"I thought the alien clone thing wasn't an issue," she says.

"Well," he answers in a slow, enunciated drawl, "just like the other time he told me it wasn't an issue, it has, indeed, seem to become an issue."

Isabel instantly comes to the conclusion that grilling Kepler about his relationship issues is _multitudes_ more entertaining than the melancholy introspection that dwelling on her old crew involves, and sits up straighter even as Kepler sinks further into the cushions of his armchair. "How're you holding up?" she asks, deceptively innocent.

"Mostly thinking that I don't need to put up with this," Kepler grumbles.

"I think he just needs some time."

"Do I really want to be with someone who changes his mind at the drop of a hat?" Warren manages to make his next sip of whiskey look _contemptuous_ , everything from the delicate tip of his glass to the upturn of his nose. Kepler's always been a man who's acutely aware of how he appears to others, and he smirks when he catches Lovelace snickering at the theatrical gesture. More seriously: "He's always had a problem with _unrealistic expectations_."

"Were they really so unrealistic?" Lovelace meets his curious look with a pointed one of her own. If Jacobi reaffirms Kepler's perspectives and Maxwell refines them, Isabel's taken on the role of challenging them. Something he actually seems to appreciate. "You made it a point to look like you were always in control," she adds, "so he's just believing what you told him."

"Things go off the rails all the time. It's just that I'm usually _prepared_ for it."

"So you were totally prepared for us to succeed in the mutiny?"

"It was a possibility I was ready for." Kepler exhales, deep and slow. "Retaking the station when Hera went down for a reboot was a contingency. Even the aliens being hostile, which was why I suggested having the psi-wave regulators going--"

"You didn't account for him turning against you?"

"No. That's the one thing I _didn't_ prepare for."

"Okay, that's almost kinda cute." Lovelace doesn't bother hiding her grin behind her glass. "Has that changed?"

" _Yes_ , that's changed."

"Don't you think-- oh." She pulls her phone out of her pocket. "Wait, it's Minkowski."

Kepler motions for her to go ahead and take the call, slumping back into his seat with a brooding, unhappy look on his face. He takes a sip of his drink while Lovelace and Minkowski greet each other, his dark mood lifting only marginally as the cheshire-cat grin on Lovelace's face melts into a softer, easier smile. She flashes Kepler the screen, prompting him to greet Minkowski with a polite little wave before turning it back to herself.

Minkowski, on speaker, seems to tap the screen on her end. Video conferencing apps were probably less advanced when she was last on Earth. "What are you up to, Captain?"

"Oh, Kepler's having relationship problems."

There's an exaggerated gasp of shock from the phone while Kepler glares daggers at Lovelace. "Relationship? With... Jacobi?"

"Recent development."

"Wow, congrats." To Lovelace, gleefully: "What did I say? Terrible person, but not a _protocol-breaker_."

"Oh, be quiet. If you were really that confident, you would've bet more than ten." 

"What're they fighting about this time?"

"Sounds kinda like Jacobi isn't really into Kepler being a normal person who does normal person things and has normal person feelings."

"Ooooof." A pause. "I mean, technically--"

"You know what I mean."

Minkowski must have gestured for Lovelace to turn the phone around, because she does, and Renée leans forward for a better look at Kepler sulking. "I think we've all been there," she says matter-of-factly. Being the only one of the crew who's navigated a _marriage_ , and a rare healthy one at that, she gives him a sympathetic smile. "You have an image of someone, and it turns out they aren't everything you thought. You're gonna be a little disappointed, sure, but part of navigating a relationship is realizing what clicks, seeing their flaws and deciding whether or not it's something you want to live with, and understanding that they're probably doing the same for you. You have to _learn_ to make it work. It takes time and communication."

Lovelace's wheedling didn't make any headway, but apparently Minkowski's level-headed advice strikes a nerve. "Yeah," Kepler huffs, "I _know_. I've been making adjustments, but if he doesn't even know what he wants from me, how am _I_ supposed to figure out what to--"

"Time, and communication! Also, you're _you_." Minkowski gives him a skeptical look. "You're really gonna tell us that you don't know what he wants, Kepler?" 

Warren will admit that he's made an entire lifestyle out of figuring out what the people around him want, then giving it to them before they realize it themselves. It makes them malleable, makes them believe that his interests align naturally with theirs. It's a move he'd learned from watching Cutter, who was terrifying and amoral and murderous, but smart in ways that Kepler hadn't realized someone _could_ be. "We've had nothing _but_ time and communication," he points out. "What he wants is _not that_."

"Jacobi's a smart guy, he'll come around." 

"Maybe you could try talking to him instead of losing your temper and stomping away," Lovelace suggests.

"I know how this works. _I_ know how to be serious about someone."

"Uh, does Jacobi... not?"

"Far as I know, he's never been with anyone for more than a few months." Under his breath: "I'm starting to see why."

"Oh! He's never made it past the honeymoon period." Minkowski's expression is sly, a little mocking. She's been spending _far_ too much time with Lovelace. "You're gonna have to take the lead on this one. We know how much you like to do that, so..."

"He's a _grown man_ \--"

"Everyone has blind spots! You wouldn't be this mad if it was Maxwell who couldn't get you."

"Dr. Maxwell sees people for what they are. I thought Jacobi did, too."

"Well," says Minkowski, "love makes you stupid. You're not being rational about this either."

He's more than once used the fact that infatuation makes a person's IQ take a complete nosedive to his advantage, but Kepler still manages to look offended. "Excuse me?"

"You're spilling this to me and _Lovelace_."

"Maxwell would just tell me what I already know: that relationships are _stupid_."

Lovelace elaborates, still giving him the teasing grin she hasn't been able to wipe off her face. Unlike Jacobi, who seems to like it when Kepler's in control, she rather likes the sight of Kepler in mild distress over something stupid, however well he tries to play it off. "You're confiding in two people who, not even half a year ago, were ready to kill you."

"Given that you two are responding with genuinely good advice," Kepler retorts, tipping the two remaining chips of ice still swimming in the dregs of his glass into his mouth, "doesn't that seem to have been the right decision?" 

Lovelace leans back in her seat. She looks down at the phone in her hands, meeting Minkowski's eyeroll with one of her own. "I hate it when he has a point," she grumbles. "Think this is our cue to give him really _shitty_ advice."

"Give him the silent treatment and show him what-for," Minkowski calls out.

"If he tries to talk it out, take him in the worst faith possible and then use his words against him." 

"Whatever you do, don't ask for clarification and don't give him any if he asks."

"Tell him that if he's not reading your mind, he's not pulling his weight."

"Oh," Kepler says, expression brightening, a tone of false cheer instantly permeating his voice, "wonderful suggestions, just what I was gonna do!" He pushes himself to his feet, extends his hand for Lovelace's empty tumbler and excuses himself while Lovelace and Minkowski continue their conversation.


	16. Chapter 16

Minkowski waits for Kepler to leave the apartment before she leans closer to the camera, sounding completely unrepentant. "Am I a bad person for enjoying this?" she whispers, setting the tablet upright on something before she sinks back into the couch cushions. Portions of the rest of the living room in Pennsylvania are visible over her shoulder, but the place is dimly lit and the only outside noise seems to be a barking dog from next door. Pryce and Eiffel must already have turned in for the night.

"Oh," Isabel laughs, "absolutely."

"Not that he's having relationship problems," Minkowski adds, "but more that... we have the luxury of worrying about stuff like this. You know what I mean?"

"I know what you mean," Lovelace reassures her.

"Well," she says after a moment, "hey, let him know if he ever needs to talk--"

"Minkowski," Lovelace cuts in, gently interrupting. "Stop."

"Stop?"

"Kepler's a big boy. He can handle this on his own." She snorts at the skeptical look Minkowski flashes her, a silent _Are you sure?_ posed entirely through the wrinkle of her nose and the quirk of her brows. "He wants our input," Lovelace continues, "he'll ask for it. We only got started on this in the first place 'cause I was pushing."

"You know he won't."

"Exactly. Because he doesn't want our input."

"Okay," Minkowski concedes, "okay. Point taken. What have you been up to?"

"Not much," Lovelace says, an automatic response. There was never much time for heart-to-heart conversations on the Hephaestus, and while Lambert and Hui were good friends, rank kept her from _actually_ unloading her worries on them. She'd simply fallen out of the habit. 

Minkowski, being Minkowski, doesn't let it slide. She never does. "Really?" she asks, equal parts skeptical and concerned. Knowing Lovelace, and knowing Kepler, the idea of either of them spending a week doing 'not much' is unlikely at best. "I just figured since you four got Vic and Hera set up, you've been pretty busy."

"Well... I picked up some letters from the first Hephaestus mission." Knowing what they say doesn't make it less painful, but more and more, the stab of guilt when she thinks about them is less sharp, less frequent. There were times on the Hephaestus that she thought she'd never see the letters again, much less be able to deliver them to their intended destinations. At some point, she still has to take Jacobi and Maxwell to task over them; the idea is less nauseating than it used to be. "The ones from my crew."

"Oh. How?"

"I asked Kepler and he came through."

A storm of questions crosses Minkowski's face, but she takes a deep breath and puts them to the side. "Are you alright?" she asks. 

"They weren't in English," Lovelace tells her, too tired to elaborate, "but I'm just glad I got 'em. I'm only... bringing it up to ask how you're doing."

"Really well, actually." Minkowski actually looks _bewildered_ as she leans to the side to show Lovelace how tidy and well-kept they've made the place. "We received packages with new IDs yesterday, and Maxwell left one of her laptops for Pryce. They're coordinating software upgrades for Hera and Vic, but since the AIs' physical mainframes aren't here and it all goes through Maxwell, I'm not too worried."

After months of being in the company of the SI-5, they both understand that if pushed to it, Maxwell wouldn't hesitate to take Hera out of commission again. They _also_ know that she wouldn't want to. "Keep an eye on her, though."

"Oh, absolutely. Also, Eiffel seems to really enjoy cooking. He said he's a little burned out on the Star Wars complete collection and started streaming Top Chef." The confusion hasn't left Minkowski's face, and she laughs when she settles back into her seat. "Kepler had the local grocery store deliver a box of ingredients and challenged Doug to make dinner from scratch, so that was exciting. I honestly don't know where he finds the time."

Lovelace snorts. "How'd that go?"

"We're still trying to scrape the burnt bits off the pot," Minkowski answers, "but what we managed to recover was pretty good. He felt bad about it, but honestly, it was fun."

"Okay. Now," Lovelace repeats, more firmly this time, "how are _you_ holding up?"

That gives her pause. Minkowski blinks a few times, seems to consider her answer, and finally says, "I mean, we do what we have to, right?"

"It's just," says Lovelace, "see, I lost my crew, and despite everything Hilbert's done, I know you still considered him part of yours. And now with Eiffel..."

"It's... not easy." Absently untying her hair, Minkowski shakes out her tight, regulation bun and runs her fingers anxiously through the strands. "Things were so much _harder_ every day in space, but there are so many more things to take care of here."

"Oh, I get you. The Hephaestus routine was predictable. Wake up, coffee, life-threatening emergency for sixteen hours, sleep..."

"Right? We were always fixing something or moving something else around, but it was all happening in this vacuum."

"Literally."

"Yeah. Now I'm getting e-mails?" Minkowski laughs, letting her head fall back. "We have to go to the grocery store, and the hardware store sometimes, and the bank... suddenly there's all these points of failure and external factors that we never had to consider on the Hephaestus. We sprang a leak in the kitchen the other day and I felt my blood pressure hit the roof."

"Is everything okay?"

"Eiffel helped me replace the faucet and everything was fine." Words neither of them had ever thought they'd say again. "It wasn't even a real emergency."

"It would've been on the Hephaestus," Lovelace points out. 

"I know." An everyday problem resolved quickly and easily is an experience they'll have to get used to back on earth. Preferably without the dose of adrenaline. "I feel... okay?"

They exchange a look, equal parts tired and relieved. "Well," says Lovelace, "when you're baptized in fire, everything else comes easy."

* * *

Lovelace is still on the couch when Jacobi and Maxwell return, the two of them jostling each other in the door before Jacobi lets her through. Maxwell heads straight for the room she shares with Lovelace, shutting the door behind her while Jacobi slowly kicks off his sandals. "Kepler around?" he asks, trying to sound casual.

"He went for a walk."

"That's not like him." 

Lovelace bats a dismissive hand at him, but Daniel sees her watching for a reaction. "Think he's just gone to cool his head for a bit."

That puts to rest any hope that Lovelace might not be aware of what just went down, and Daniel sighs. She and Kepler have gotten pretty close over the last few months, though he hadn't expected them to become confidantes for each other. On some level it makes perfect sense; Warren never unloaded his worries on Daniel, and Lovelace kept hers from her crew as well. 

Daniel sighs. "I screwed up, huh?"

"Nah." Breezy and confident, Lovelace flashes him a wry grin. "You're both exhausting, though."

"But Captain, that's one of my best qualities."

"He'll come back."

"I'm not worried about that."

Lovelace raises her brows, giving him a curious look. She'll never be an expert on the Kepler-Jacobi dynamic (if asked, she'd say that she already knows way more than she wants to), but on an individual basis they're simple enough to figure out. "What... _are_ you worried about?"

"Didn't realize he was so sensitive about it, is all."

He puts on a good show of nonchalance, but Daniel turns his head when he hears footsteps coming down the hall outside, listening intently for a few seconds before he stops paying attention and the strides continue down the corridor. 

"Jacobi," says Lovelace, deciding with great difficulty not to point out what he'd just done, "I... _really_ don't want to get involved in this." That part's not quite true; she's pretty sure she'll never get bored of watching Kepler struggle with acting like a regular person with no rank and no place in any kind of corporate hierarchy, but Jacobi doesn't have to know that. "But after the last couple months," she continues, "I _get_ why you trusted Kepler the way you did. There's gonna be all this stupid, insane crap coming down the line for us, and he'll come through. This won't be any different."

"That's professional. This is personal."

"It's not that different." She scowls at the face he makes. "Oh, get over yourself, Jacobi. You really think you _compartmentalized_ the corporate black ops stuff away from who you are as a _person_?" 

"Okay," he squawks, "why are we talking about me all of a sudden?!"

"You, a person, made the choice to do the things you did, and that includes the really bad stuff you did, and the really cool stuff you did." He looks slightly mollified that she'd called him cool, at least enough to let her finish. "Like saving us and getting us off the Hephaestus. People change by the day. By the hour. By the _minute_. Deal with it."

"I'm going to bed," he huffs, but not without a small, grateful smile. "See you in the morning, Captain."

"G'night, nerd."

Daniel takes a scalding shower, not so distracted that he can't appreciate the water pressure or the massage extension's steady pressure on his back and shoulders. Kepler might be an unrelenting workaholic, but the man knows his showers. Jacobi stays in there for a while, scrubbing sand out of places he didn't expect to find sand after sitting fully-clothed on a beach, and eventually steps out.

Kepler's already back, in the middle of peeling off his socks when Jacobi swings the bathroom door open. He straightens when he finally gets them off, watching. 

"Turning in?" Daniel asks, plucking absently at the t-shirt he'd picked out from Kepler's closet. He _has_ clothes now, but the habit is hard to break. 

Kepler shakes his head, gesturing toward his desk with a tilt of his head. "I've got some work to do," he says softly. "Go ahead without me."

Daniel is... aware that Kepler's been putting off mountains of work. It was simultaneously flattering and concerning to see the unfinished charts still open on his laptop screen, his assortment of half-polished weapons. It shouldn't be surprising that he'd want to focus on it again after the conversation they just had, but they've been together for a week and Daniel winces at the physical ache in his chest when Warren sits down at his desk without so much as a brush of their shoulders. 

He turns in his seat when he doesn't hear Daniel move, his brows furrowing. He's wired despite the exhaustion-- Daniel knows that tightness around his mouth, the tense set of his shoulders, that insistence on getting back to work. After a second, Kepler's expression softens, a smile just barely quirking up one corner of his mouth. "Daniel," he says, "we'll talk in the morning. Get some rest."

The morning seems like a _lifetime_ away all of a sudden, and Daniel opens his mouth to protest.

His impulse to hash this out on the spot is immediately overtaken by a yawn, and Daniel retreats to the bed, flopping down on top of it and shaking out the neatly-folded blanket to pull it over himself. "Yeah," he answers. "Don't stay up too late."

* * *

Jacobi wakes up to the sound of running water, still tired. Not too long ago, Kepler's presence alone was enough to let him knock out in peace but he'd slept fitfully, not at all lulled by the sound of tapping keys. He has no idea whether Warren had eventually joined him in bed or if he'd retreated to the couch, worked through the night, or just cleared out of the apartment altogether. He wouldn't be surprised about any of those possibilities. 

Still, he appreciates the space; being around an unsettled Kepler has the unfortunate effect of making Daniel want to salute and say 'Yes sir' or just to get the hell out of dodge, neither one of those responses particularly conducive to Mature Conflict Resolution. 

"Hey," he says, sticking his head around the edge of the doorway and blinking sleepily as Warren runs one of those cheap blue razors under the stream of his faucet, the bottom half of his face already white and frothy with shaving cream, nothing but a towel wrapped low on his hips. 

Daniel's caught him in this routine before, on early assignments when they shared a room. It's another one of those rare places Kepler likes to take his time and he'd walked Daniel through the whole ritual once, insisting that it would improve his shave. 

He looks at Daniel out of his periphery now, flashing a brief smile before he finally drags the razor down his cheek. The movement is smooth, methodical as everything else he does. 

Then, finally done, Kepler rinses off the razor, splashes water on his face, wipes it with a towel. He's running his fingers across his freshly-shaven chin when he ducks around Jacobi and heads into the bedroom. There's a deliberate ease to his movements, the casual way he steps into his jeans and pulls on a shirt that says he's _unbothered_. But he still waits until he's fully clothed to properly address Jacobi. "What do you need, Daniel?"

"So you uh, you were right." Daniel considers that a man shouldn't be able to go from Warren, unguarded and playful, to Colonel Kepler, cool and detached, with this kind of speed. But at least he knows Colonel Kepler, knows what to expect from him. Knows that while he hates many things, such as 'being lied to' and 'lack of a big picture', he's never punished Daniel for clarification. Better to ask than to screw up an entire operation because they weren't on the same page. "Things're different," Daniel says, "and I didn't know how to deal with that. That's on me."

Kepler nods, taking a long moment to collect himself before he says, "I figured," and takes a deep, slow breath. "Listen," he continues matter-of-factly, "if it's not what you're looking for, it's not what you're looking for. We don't have to waste each other's time." 

He waits, eyes on Daniel's face, and his brows furrow when the younger man grimaces. There are a lot of things Daniel would call the past week-- confusing, nerve-wracking and tiring, among others-- but he hadn't even come close to considering any of it a _waste of time_.

"And being an alien clone," Kepler adds when the silence goes on a little too long, brushing his hair out of his eyes and slicking it back, "that's still a risk. We have no idea how it's changed things, so you weren't wrong. It _would_ simplify both of our lives to end this."

It's awfully _unlike_ Kepler to take the cut-and-run method of problem solving, and Jacobi consciously wrestles his thoughts away from the blaring FAULTY ALIEN CLONE direction they're trying to take him in. 

Kepler is... single-minded and tenacious, simultaneously able to see and account for all the moving parts of an operation without ever losing sight of the objective. Daniel had known that about him for six years, occasionally wondering if that carried over to the less professional parts of his life (the answer to that, as he's recently learned, is a resounding Yes). If Warren's goal is to maintain whatever they had going, he's not doing a very good job of it.

It never is that simple with him. 

If Daniel widens his scope enough, he can guess that Kepler's got too much on his plate to deal with the stress of a relationship, a nearly-omnipresent tech conglomerate waiting to be taken down. Zoom in, and there are six people and two AIs whose safety and wellbeing are contingent on his choices. 

Tweak the focus a little, and...

"That's not what I meant," Daniel says, pulling the desk chair and dropping onto it. "I just meant-- y'know, for six years, I knew one version of you, and I was _super into_ that guy."

Kepler's shoulders don't relax, his posture stiff. He exhales through his nose and says, "This other guy isn't the one you want." A sigh. "You knew my _job_."

"It was a really sexy job," Daniel agrees, and that finally startles a quiet laugh out of Kepler. "So when you started being a _person_ on me, even though it's what I asked for, it just-- I didn't think you'd actually do it. I was kinda just expecting status quo with benefits."

"Status quo with benefits," Kepler repeats, unable to _completely_ fight back a crooked half-smile. Must be getting soft. 

"Don't cancel Warren Kepler again," Daniel says quickly, turning his chair back and forth a few times, "but I think I'm gonna need some time."

"And I'm just supposed to wait on you to make up your mind?"

Daniel's first impulse is to bark _No sir, of course not, sir_ , but after a moment, at the expectant quirk of Warren's brows and the purse of his lips, he grins. For once in his life, Kepler's the one who can wait. "You wanna expedite the process a little," Daniel tells him, "you could, uh..."

"I could...?"

"Not be so frickin' _gentle_ with me." 

Warren's nose crinkles as he considers those words. 

"Whatever nice-guy civvie persona you're going for," Jacobi tells him, "I don't think that's you, and I don't need to be _handled_." Part of him wonders if Kepler would take offense to being told that playing the part of a sweet, thoughtful partner doesn't suit him, that Daniel's not interested in whoever Kepler thinks he wants him to be. "Look," Daniel sighs, leaning back, his legs sprawled in front of him to brace the chair, "I don't wanna assume anything about your, y'know, _proclivities_ , but any time you feel like taking off the kid gloves..."

Daniel trails off, freezing in place as Warren approaches, stopping in the space between his ankles. He leans forward and braces both hands on the arms of the chair. "Mr. Jacobi," Kepler says, bringing his face close to growl softly into Daniel's ear, "when have I _ever_ treated you with kid gloves?" 

"Well," answers Jacobi, abruptly dry-mouthed and too aware of Warren's breath on his skin, "when you didn't tell me to get over myself or you'd inflict violence so graphic that recordings of it would be banned in all but the most third-world of countries, that was-- y'know, kid-glove-y."

Kepler doesn't dispute that, the predatory inflection gone from his voice just as suddenly as it had come on. "Different contexts," he points out, thoughtful now, though Daniel can't see his face, "require different approaches."

In his head, Daniel can hear Alana's voice laughing at him. He shifts one hand from his lap to Kepler's wrist, fingers skimming lightly across his skin to curl around his forearm and give it a gentle squeeze. "Maybe," he answers, "I want to know who you are without all that context." 

There's a second where he wonders if he'd said something wrong, if there really is _nothing_ without all that context. If Warren had canceled himself so hard that even he's not sure what's left, and if he realizes _that_ , he'll want nothing to do with the guy who pointed it out to him. Kepler's arm is tense and hard under Jacobi's fingertips, and he feels the muscles shift before Kepler actually moves.

Daniel would say that he's gotten pretty good at reading Kepler over the years, but even he doesn't expect the way he pulls back, just enough to make eye contact. Warren's expression is careful, his brows anxiously drawn together. His voice is low and soft, as if telling Daniel a secret. "I'm still figuring that out," he says, "myself."

Maybe, Daniel considers, that's what he'd been waiting to hear. "Let me help," he whispers back, leaning in. 

Warren kisses him roughly, urgently. Up to this point, he was careful in every application of his tongue, and his lips, and his teeth. Daniel has no complaints about that, but Kepler, unfettered and unplanned, was always the one Daniel had his eyes on. Warren presses one knee against the front edge of the chair, denim rough through the material of the shorts Daniel had gone to sleep in, and moves both hands to the back of the seat. Springs creak as he presses in, tilts it back--

Daniel's life has flashed before his eyes many, many times; one of the occupational hazards of being both a demolitions expert and an operative of the SI-5. He has enough time to relive the entire summer he worked the cheese counter at Milwaukee's premier local high-end grocery between his seat tipping past the point of no return and the moment Kepler wraps his hand around the base of his skull to blunt the collision against the corner of his desk. 

Both of them take a second to confirm that neither of them have died, and breathe a synchronized sigh of relief.

"What are we," Daniel groans from the floor, startled but unhurt, "teenagers?"

Kepler had caught himself on the desk, and there's a nasty contusion on the back of his hand-- the flesh-and-blood one. "Not for nothing," he says, visibly embarrassed but trying to shrug it off as he pulls Daniel to his feet and rights the chair, "but teenaged me would've just let you take the hit."

"So romantic," Jacobi deadpans.

Warren bares his teeth, his canines tinted red around the edges. "I don't need to hear that from the one who nearly bit through my tongue just now," he complains. That's more injuries in two seconds than he gets on most assignments.

"Lemme see," Daniel shoots back, laughing but sympathetic as he steps into Kepler's space to pull him down. "I'll kiss it better." 

Warren is uncharacteristically quiet, letting Daniel turn his head but not allowing himself to be dragged forward. His hands settle on Jacobi's hips, holding him back from coming any closer but not pushing him away, either. Kepler's gaze never leaves Daniel's face, calm behind the dark fringe of hair that had fallen into his eyes when they lost their balance. 

"What?" Jacobi teases, a joke to offset the unnerving silence. He reaches up and brushes the hair out of Warren's face. "Cat got your tongue? Colonel Kepler's got nothing to say for the first time in his life?"

Warren huffs, pulling him in. "This is hardly the first time you've left me speechless, Daniel."

* * *

When Kepler finally steps into the living room Maxwell looks up from the kitchen counter, her phone laid flat on the marble. Hera's shell is nowhere to be seen, probably out on some errand with Lovelace. She gives him a long, appraising look, and smiles softly at the self-conscious way he checks his reflection in the mirror. There's the bruise on his left hand, and fresh welts along his biceps, but nothing _too_ obvious, so he shrugs. "You should see the other guy," Warren quips.

Shaking her head, Maxwell turns back to her phone. "I take it you two worked things out."

"I think that's a fair assumption to make." Kepler yawns as he makes a round through the kitchen, opening a cabinet for two mugs and a container of coffee grounds. He starts a pot, pressing a few buttons before he leaves the machine. "You talked to him?"

"You're welcome," says Maxwell. "Where's Daniel?"

"Sleeping in." Kepler goes for the fridge next, pouring tea from a pitcher into Maxwell's cup and sliding it across the counter to her. "Want anything for breakfast?"

"I saw a waffle iron in that cabinet," she comments, grinning wide. Kepler'll never give her a straight 'thank you', especially not when she's done something unprompted for him, but he always knows how to repay her. "And I didn't know you could cold-brew tea."

"You can cold-brew anything," he says absently, already pulling eggs and butter and milk. "Waffles it is, Dr. Maxwell."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i kno i've written like 120k+ words of this but this is probably my most meaningful contribution to this fandom
> 
>  


	17. Chapter 17

"I forgot you worked breakfast," Maxwell says when Kepler sets her waffles in front of her. There's a plastic quart container of whipped cream on the counter behind him and a pint of honey butter, both whisked on the spot, and a bowl of freshly-washed berries. "You're really good at this," she adds, happily accepting the little decanter of maple syrup he slides across the counter. Alana pours it over her breakfast, making sure to catch the delicate, oblong quenelles of whipped cream and butter in the drizzle.

"I ever tell you about when I worked at a restaurant just off campus when I was in undergrad?" he asks, ladling batter into the waffle iron. It's a silly question; he'd never talked about life before Goddard in all four years they were co-workers. Considering how long he'd been working for the company, it stood to reason that he simply hadn't made his way that far back. 

Maxwell looks up, watching the cheeky grin on his face turn downright devious when he sees her mutinous expression, her cheeks stuffed and distended so she can't interrupt his story. 

"You remember chef Tomas when you and Jacobi were training for Provence?" Kepler had joined them for the last week out of the month they'd taken, part-time in the Goddard cafeteria between their projects in R&D, claiming to need a refresher if he's to be taken seriously as a sous-chef in France. Maxwell suspects that he'd just dropped in to check their progress; Warren didn't _seem_ to need a refresher. "He trained me way back when, too. Three months in, he said he was moving to Florida to get closer to his family. I mentioned it to Cutter and got him into the kitchen at Canaveral." 

Maxwell spears a strawberry on her fork, then a piece of waffle, taking care to smear as much whipped cream and butter on the payload as possible. "You had a direct line to Mr. Cutter when you were in undergrad?" 

"He was Willis Fletcher, back then. Still head of communications." Warren flashes her a grin over his shoulder, at once wild and sheepish. He's still plenty audacious, but back then, he hadn't known _just_ how high in the company food chain Cutter actually was. "Probably thought it was funny that some punk kid was passing information along. Tomas was reliable, though. That's not easy to come by in any industry."

Almost as difficult to come by as honesty from Kepler. Maxwell watches him pry a waffle of his own out of the iron, cut it into quarters, and transfer it to a plate. "How did you end up working in that kitchen?" Alana asks. "Was it something your handler suggested?"

"Naw, I always wanted to go into one of those upscale joints but never had the money for it." He doesn't look at her when he answers, too busy scooping his own whipped cream and butter, adding a handful of the mixed berries. Maxwell hasn't made a quenelle in years and as far as she knows, neither had Kepler, but the movement is smooth and easy. He seems to genuinely enjoy the process. "Goddard was paying my tuition for undergrad, but I had to cover rent and food. Figured I could see what it was all about from the inside, and a couple years down the line, Cutter tapped me to staff the Molecular Gastronomy division at HQ when that program started." 

Absently gnawing on the tines of her fork, Maxwell considers that despite what she'd read in his file, this is the first time he's ever even hinted at a time in his life when money was an issue. For as long as she's known him, he's had access to his Director of Intelligence salary, the black metal-plated company credit card. Kepler styled himself after Cutter in the office-- bespoke suits and shoes, tasteful but bold ties. Practical but undeniably expensive watches. In the field, he liked military-grade tactical gear, all expensive in their own way. 

"Long story short," Kepler finishes cheerfully, "I went from being an upstart in Legal to middle management in HR and Logistics. There was a pay cut, because lawyers are obscenely paid, but it was something new."

Maxwell catches his eye when he finally turns around, a fully loaded plate in hand. He whips out his phone and takes the maple syrup, recording about six seconds of pouring it over the artful stack of waffles. She props her chin on the heel of her palm, watching Kepler send the recipe and video to Eiffel. "Was working in a restaurant the last thing you did for yourself before Goddard started running your life?"

Kepler lowers his phone, staring down at his screen as he processes the question, then wrestles briefly with an answer. Meeting her gaze again, he gives her an exasperated look, the _It's too early for these piercing questions about my lifestyle_ face, and shrugs. "I suppose it was."

* * *

Kepler catches Maxwell looking-- really _looking_ at him when he finally starts to eat, still standing at the counter. She can be subtle, usually when it's part of her cover on an assignment, but for some reason or another she's never particularly felt the need to hide her observation from him. "Is it good?" she asks when he digs in, her eyes on the long, red welts on his arms.

"I made it," Warren retorts, focused only on demolishing his breakfast, "of course it's good."

"Not that," Maxwell sighs. "I meant... you and Jacobi."

"The... relationship?" He looks at her face, follows her gaze to the marks Jacobi'd left on him when he'd dragged his blunt nails down his arms earlier that morning, and arches his brows. "Sex?"

Thankfully, Kepler's not in the habit of making things any more awkward than they have to be, so Maxwell presses her lips together and says, "Yes."

"People wouldn't do it if it wasn't." Warren shrugs. "Either. Both."

"But it's different for everyone?"

"Sure."

"Sir?"

"Hm?"

Maxwell takes a moment to appreciate how _expressive_ the colonel can be. He often takes pains to suppress facial expressions that could hint to any emotional or physical vulnerability, but the question of _Why me?_ posed through the set of his brows, the unhappy purse of his lips, would make her laugh if she didn't genuinely want answers. "It's different from when you're alone?"

Having been briefly torn between ignoring her to finish his breakfast and completing the conversation so he can finish his breakfast, Kepler seems to have decided on the latter. He resolutely holds her gaze, waiting on her next question with the same sort of challenging anticipation she's often directed at _him_ during a briefing. "If... you're doing it right." 

"Between men and women," Maxwell says, "which do you prefer?"

"I prefer," Kepler drawls, "the person I chose to be with."

More quietly: "Have you been with a lot of people you didn't choose to be with?"

"I've been with some people because Goddard Futuristics, and by extension I, wanted something from them." 

Reassured that she hadn't accidentally touched on some horrifically traumatic experience, Maxwell nods. "Which one is easier?"

"As long as you know what the other party wants, it's pretty easy."

"Do you know what Daniel wants?"

Heaving a sigh, Kepler nudges a blueberry into a cell of his waffle. "Daniel," he grumbles, "doesn't even know what Daniel wants."

That actually does make her laugh, the sound trailing off into a thoughtful hum. Kepler's usually so perceptive, but Jacobi's never had him as anything other than a commanding officer. They were _friends_ , sure, but that was secondary to the chain of command. Warren can change gears on a dime, taking on whatever form he thinks is needed of him, but Daniel doesn't even know what form he wants that to be. No wonder they're both frustrated. 

"So the most efficient thing to do," Maxwell probes, "is whatever your partner likes?"

And-- that's it. It's too much for him. Kepler inhales through his nose, his shoulders drawing up, before he delicately sets down his fork. "Sometimes," he says, laying both palms flat on the table, "you're not aiming for _efficiency_." He takes a second to consider Maxwell, attentive but nervous across the counter. "You can't ignore your own preferences, either. Ideally, everyone gets something out of it." 

"And is that something 'orgasms'?"

He gives her a withering look. "Don't you think Jacobi could give you a better answer?" A more _normal_ answer, he means. Probably something about a physical and emotional connection. The spiel about intimacy and closeness. Besides, Kepler's always passed off the work he doesn't want to do to Jacobi. "Ask him."

"I think," Alana says, "you can give me a more useful answer. This is purely intellectual curiosity, sir. He'd make it something it's not."

"Why the sudden interest? You have someone in mind?" Having reached the end of his patience, Kepler leans forward, the indulgent, mellow look on his face exchanged for a keen stare. "Captain Lovelace?"

"No," Maxwell answers. "I mean, she's very attractive, but no, that's not the reason I'm asking. I _personally_ think people are best admired from a distance."

"Hera?" No denial. "Maxwell," he says, slowly, "she has no physical _form_." 

Still no denial.

Kepler squints at her. "Is that the appeal?"

Jacobi, being a relatively nice man who likes Kepler a lot, would've backed screaming out of this conversation about five exchanges ago. Maxwell has no such instinct. "I'm not _interested_ in _that_ way," she insists, resolutely pretending that her face hadn't immediately flushed at the implication, "but we were talking about how to give her more of the experiences humans might have, and obviously, sex came up."

"Obviously?"

"Well, you and Jacobi aren't that subtle." To Kepler's credit, only his ears turn red and there's no change at all to his expression. They do this to each other way too much. "She's capable of the full range of human emotions, but a lot of emotional reactions are tied to physical sensation. Hera can feel temperature, pressure, pain-- her sensors can be overloaded in a way that causes distress-- we were wondering if we can't work out how to send feedback that's... pleasurable?"

"It's mental, too," Kepler points out.

"That's a little easier to work around."

He makes a thoughtful sound, turning back to his breakfast. "You might be the first person to ask an AI what her kinks are." 

"I'm definitely not."

"Unsurprised, yet... still disappointed."

"Is it something you could describe in enough detail to--"

"If you wanted to experience it for yourself," he says firmly, cutting her off, "there are services you can call, and other resources on the internet."

"I was actually hoping you'd have suggestions other than that," she says, lips pursed.

"Were you hoping I'd volunteer?"

"Volunteer for what?" Jacobi asks from the doorway to their room.

Warren waits for him to finish yawning. "Maxwell's curious about sex," he says.

" _Snitch._ "

"Did you just say you'd volunteer?"

Maxwell opens her mouth to take Daniel off whatever runaway train of thought he's about to board, but Kepler holds up a hand to stop her. "Would you have a problem if I did?" he asks instead, expression neutral and curious, his eyes fixed on Daniel's face.

"I think," Jacobi says, approaching the counter to steal a strawberry half off Maxwell's plate, then the last quarter of waffle that she hadn't finished, "you two can keep it professional." The last part of that comes out muffled, as he'd tried to eat the whole thing in one bite.

"That's not what I was going to suggest," Alana huffs, "but I did consider the possibility. We just don't really have time for an AI programming bootcamp."

Daniel moves behind Kepler to ladle a serving of batter into the waffle iron as the colonel begins to eat in earnest. It's always a fascinating sight for Maxwell, who consumes food at the speed of an average human being and not a Hoover vacuum. 

"You know," she says as Daniel turns back toward the counter to pick at Kepler's plate, "if I was just curious about sex, I don't need anyone else for that." She's used to both of them listening despite looking as if they're paying no attention at all, and plows on even as Kepler smacks Jacobi's hands away from his food with a reminder that his own breakfast is already working. "I'm trying to accurately reproduce a physical experience for an entity who doesn't experience physical sensation."

"Uh, let's put this conversation on hold." Daniel plants a slightly sticky kiss on Kepler's cheek, then ducks behind him to curl his arms around his ribs once it becomes clear that he won't be getting any of the other man's breakfast. It's uncharacteristically affectionate, and, Warren decides, painfully cute. "Hey," Daniel says softly.

Warren downs a huge gulp of his coffee and turns his head, pressing his lips briefly to Jacobi's temple. "What do you want?" he whispers back.

Jacobi grins. "I need a lab." 

"Chemical? Demolitions? Retriever?"

"Yeah. All of the above. Don't suppose you have some of those lying around?"

"Unfortunately, I don't have a spare dog." Kepler picks up his phone, unlocks it, and starts browsing his list of contacts. He stops at one particular name and swipes out a message. "How do you feel about working at NewTech? You may need to retrofit their facilities a bit and the commute's long, but they've got the equipment. And you can supervise the clean water initiative that Goddard's gonna hand them. I was just about to head over there."

"Oh. Newton?" Daniel absently buries his face in the crook of Warren's neck and lets his weight settle against the warm, broad back against his chest. "What is it, about an hour away?"

"Yeah."

"Sounds good." 

"That's settled then. I'll send you the details in an hour." Kepler brings the phone to his ear just as Jacobi pulls away, a timer beeping to indicate his finished waffle. "Doctor Tyson!" he says as Maxwell takes both their used plates and ducks around him to join Jacobi by the sink. Kepler heads for his room, pitching his voice lower as he addresses whoever's on the other end of the line. "Just the man I'm looking for."

* * *

Daniel waits until they're in the car to Newton Technologies to ask, "What was that with you and Maxwell?" He eyes Kepler's hand, fingers drumming against the console between their seats, and covers it with his own. The prosthetic is cool under his palm; he can feel internal structures move like actual bones under the silicone covering. Kepler doesn't look over, his other hand still on the wheel and eyes on the road, but he grins.

"I think," Warren answers, "she's into Hera."

"I mean, she's _obviously_ into Hera." Alana's been fixated on plenty of _projects_ before, but she doesn't take them out of the office with her. She doesn't stay up well into the night speaking with them, without once touching their code. She's never done therapeutic brain surgery for any of them. She doesn't take them shopping just to finish a conversation, and her face doesn't light up when other AIs ping her for attention. Daniel fits the nail of his index finger into a seam of Kepler's thumb, gently peeling back the silicone for a glimpse at the metal joint underneath. "What's that gotta do with you?"

"You know, she grew up in a _very_ religious household. Didn't socialize much in university."

"Oh." Daniel considers what he knows of her. "I thought Methodists aren't usually that fucked up about sex." 

"You don't have to be Catholic to be fucked up about sex," Warren says, and Jacobi snorts.

Daniel's not _uneasy_ about it, given how often Kepler and Maxwell pose hypotheticals to each other, but it's rare that Maxwell goes to Kepler with a genuine question over him; they're similar in too many ways for Kepler's input to be significantly helpful. Even if the discussion moves out of the realm of _hypotheticals_ , Daniel finds himself... pretty much indifferent to the possibility. "Maybe," he suggests, "it's the 'questioning her orientation' part. Is it gay if she's an AI?"

"You think either of them realizes it yet?"

"Maxwell's like, halfway to building Hera a physical body and she hasn't worked it out yet, so I dunno if they ever will." Daniel sighs. "They'll be married in three years all, Yeah, this is _purely academic_."

Warren laughs, slowly shaking his head. "Maybe I should've volunteered," he says, but he turns his wrist to catch Daniel's hand in his. 

Daniel, who has always prided himself on his rationality, considers the facts. 

One: Kepler had spent their first week together _learning_ him, obliging and attentive until he'd familiarized himself with every inch of Daniel's body. He'd given Daniel a taste of what it might've felt like to be Marcus Cutter (in a purely, he hopes, metaphorical sense), watched and waited on and _served_. Every new thing Warren learned was incorporated into the next time he had an opportunity. Kepler has never half-assed a thing in his life, which Daniel had known was a pattern with him but didn't realize would extend to something as intangible and unpredictable as their _relationship_. 

Two: Jacobi had asked him to take off that veneer and he still can't tell whether or not Warren actually did it. Whether he's _actually_ as rough and demanding as he'd been that morning (which, Daniel will admit, was _fantastic_ for him), or if he'd just flipped the 'oh, Jacobi's kinky' switch in his head and changed his M.O. to deal with it. 

Three: It doesn't matter. 

Warren Kepler becomes exactly who he wants to be, and maybe that's as deep as it goes. 

"Look," Daniel offers, "I trust both of you." Kepler squeezes his hand, the pad of his thumb brushing lightly over his knuckles. "And," he says after a pause, "I was with an older guy my first time, and he knew what he was doing. It was-- uh, it was nice."

Kepler's brows furrow. "How much older?" he asks casually, smoothly, but Daniel still feels the temperature plummet about ten degrees.

"Chill, Warren. I wasn't stupid and it didn't get weird." Daniel grins, watching Kepler purse his lips into a moue of annoyance, so different from the vicious snarl he used to show to his subordinates. "I'm just saying, you'd make sure it's a good experience. Nobody really knows what's normal or what's okay or what they really like the first time, but you've kinda-- you set the bar for what to expect, for her. And me. About a lot of things."

"Oh, that's the only reason it'd be a good experience?"

"Aw," Daniel laughs, "he's fishing."

Warren drags his fingertips lightly across the length of Daniel's palm, tickling him. "You're right," he drawls in that low, rough voice he only uses when he thinks he's being funny, "I don't need another confirmation. You gave plenty already."

Daniel pulls his hand away. "Hey!" 

"I'm just not sure that a _business transaction_ is what she's looking for." Warren keeps his eyes straight ahead, but he does flex his prosthetic a few times, prompting Daniel to return his hand to its place in his. "It's fun to figure things out as you go with someone you like," he says, "even if you end up looking stupid."

Daniel snorts. Kepler _hates_ looking stupid-- part of the reason he plans, why he has contingencies on contingencies for every possibility. Why he acts like he's in control, or at least unbothered, even when he's not. The thought that there was a Kepler before that one is difficult to picture. "Is that what you did?" he asks, and tries not to think about who he might've been with.

Warren looks at him, a quick glance before he returns his attention to the road. He smiles, shoulders lifting in an easy shrug, even though Daniel can see the tension in it. "Isn't that what we're doing?"

* * *

"Lucas Tyson," Kepler says, introducing _yet another_ tall, handsome stranger to Jacobi, "this is Nick Franklin." He'd briefed Daniel on the trip over, called him 'Franklin' and 'Nick' a few dozen times just to acclimate him to the name. Warren had neglected to mention that Lucas Tyson is just under six feet of lean muscle, looking no older than Kepler except for the shock of grey at his temples. Supposedly, he's about five years Warren's senior. "Dr. Tyson is head of Project Development at Newton Technologies. And we used to climb together before Goddard upgraded the main campus and shut down the Sanford facilities."

"It was hard moving on after Warren left me," Tyson says, his shoulders drooping in feigned grief, "but I found someone else who could belay."

Kepler scoffs, elbowing him on the upper arm. "The commute was untenable, Luke."

"Pleasure," Tyson says, laughing as he extends a hand for Daniel to shake. There's something about his charisma that's familiar to Daniel, the affectation of warmth over cold calculation. Kepler did once say that the corporate intelligence community is _very_ small.

"Uh," Jacobi answers, "likewise."

Turning to Kepler, Tyson steps in close. "You mentioned Goddard's clean water initiative on the phone?"

"I did. There are... also a few smaller projects I wanted to pitch to NewTech." For someone who'd spent so much time acting as if there was no humanity left to him, Kepler's got a lot of friends in places Daniel never expected and he's awfully tactile with all of them. Putting a hand on Tyson's shoulder, Kepler gives him a rough, friendly shake. "I know you recently expanded the budget for social improvement, and I've got good intel that Goddard's next quarter will be a little rocky. They'll be amenable to offloading a few of those charitable projects."

"All the infrastructure's in place?"

"Yeah."

"That would be amazing, if you can do it." Tyson squints at him. "What's the catch?"

Friendly or not, Daniel considers, if asked, Kepler would say that he'd established and maintained every relationship with the sole purpose of furthering the interests of Goddard Futuristics. "Mr. Franklin," Kepler says, stepping away from Tyson to clap Jacobi on the shoulder, "was one of Goddard's best in weapons R&D. He needs a lab. You've got empty labs."

"Nothing up to code for weapons R&D," Tyson says. He doesn't ask why an ex-Goddard employee is looking for a lab at Newton, and like everyone else who's worked with Kepler, seems to decide that it's better not to know. "Not sure I can help you."

"I've been informed that Mr. Franklin can retrofit them to his specifications."

"And if he needs new equipment?"

Kepler gives Daniel a look, an expectant quirk of his brow. _Well?_ it says. _Don't make me do all the work._ "Equipment can be used even after I'm done," Daniel chimes in, "and Newton can keep the rights to anything I develop here. But I want a ten percent royalty on anything produced. "

"Eight."

"Twelve," Warren cuts in. His expression grows colder, sharper. 

"Ten it is," Tyson answers, an amused look on his face. He's clearly not one to be intimidated by Kepler, though he doesn't seem to have any interest in clashing with him, either. "Won't be _my_ bonus that comes out of."

"Any supplies used in personal projects will be provided by me," Kepler adds. It's only fair, since they're the ones approaching with a request, but Daniel's seen him gain more with less of a trade-off. The whole deal seems wildly skewed in NewTech's favor, and Warren seems less concerned with optimizing his return than making sure that his team gets what it needs. It's at once surprising and expected, that Kepler's not bound to habit or routine, the ease with which he rearranges his priorities. "We're just looking for use of the lab."

Tyson fixes him with a look. "You had an AI specialist on your team too, didn't you?"

"Alana Maxwell? She's not with us anymore." Warren shrugs, nonchalant, and despite everything Daniel _knows_ to be true, he has to remind himself not to take a swing at his face. One of the drawbacks of Warren being able to _inhabit_ any role he decides to take on, especially when that role is 'guy who doesn't care about Maxwell'. "Been working with a different scientist, though. Ada Vaughan."

"We've been expanding our research into artificial intelligence," Tyson says, and that actually seems to come as a surprise to Kepler. "If you can get her on board here, the lab is yours."

"Well, you'd have to work out the terms with her yourself, but I can get you a call."

"Alright." Tyson extends his hand, and Warren clasps it with the prosthetic, the two of them pulling each other in for a quick bump of the shoulders. "Get me that call, I'll handle the rest."

"How do you feel about six, tonight?"

"Perfect." 

Tapping a little receiver clipped to the collar of his shirt, Kepler gestures for Tyson to watch. "Actually, Invictus here is one of Dr. Vaughan's recent projects. Vic, can you send Dr. Tyson her number and update Dr. Vaughan?"

A muffled buzz from Tyson's pocket prompts him to check his phone, smiling as he reads the message. "Good to meet you too," he says. "Now, you gentlemen had lunch yet? Let's finish this talk at Gatti Neri."

Kepler's expression perks. "That Italian place?" 

"Menu's been updated."

He looks at Jacobi, waiting on a nod to address Tyson again. "Let's check it out."


	18. Chapter 18

"So," Lovelace says, munching on a slice of toast beside Kepler at the kitchen island the next morning, "you're a stay-at-home-colonel today, huh?"

Kepler's been back on his computer for about ten minutes now, ignoring her teasing as he works out an update for the contacts he'd already been in touch with. In a way, refusing to meet her eyes is even more of a surrender than just engaging with the captain, so he looks up from the screen to frown at her. "It's pretty standard to make sure my team has food," he says, defensive. "And I _obviously_ have to brief them before they infiltrate." 

'Make sure my team has food' consisted of packing both Jacobi and Maxwell lunch (which is more cost-effective and better-tasting than having them buy it in the Newton cafeteria, he'd made sure to point out), and the briefing had been a dispassionate Q&A as he bundled them out the door with all their documents and NewTech ID cards. 

Lovelace had watched that entire scene from the kitchen counter, and the moment Jacobi and Maxwell shut the door behind them had informed Kepler that her mom used to do the exact same thing for her. 

Granted, mission prep at Goddard usually looked a little different. The cafeteria would provide food, and the briefing usually involved at least three manila folders and a few guns, but neither Jacobi nor Maxwell had batted an eye at the process. It's similar enough to what they'd always done that the practical realities of no longer working for Goddard could be taken in stride.

"I'm just saying," Lovelace says, grinning. "I wasn't expecting that. When I said you were dad, I wasn't being _serious_ but now I gotta rethink."

"So you don't want me to pack you a lunch," Kepler drawls, jabbing at a few keys with a little more force than strictly necessary while she snickers into her breakfast. "Got it."

"No wait," she laughs, nudging him on the shoulder, "wait, I want it. C'mon, don't play favorites. You have to treat all your kids the same."

Instead of replying, Kepler hooks one foot on the crossbar under Lovelace's stool and presses his hand high up on the chair leg closest to him. He tilts the seat, tipping Isabel off of it entirely.

* * *

About halfway to Newton, Maxwell cranks her seat back and stretches her shoulders, yawning loudly. She plays with Hera's shell on the dashboard, then checks her phone. It's unusual for Jacobi to be so quiet, especially for someone usually so full of sarcasm and biting wit, but he doesn't seem _upset_ and they haven't had nearly enough time in the trip for her to get on his nerves yet. "What's first on your list," she ventures cautiously, "Jacobi?"

That snaps him out of his thoughts, and he flashes her a smile as he considers her question. "Well," he says, "I dunno about _first_ , but Kepler and Minkowski have a list of short-range explosives they want. I'm gonna pull up an old project we shelved at Goddard to keep Newton busy, and there's at least one or two large-scale bombs the colonel wants in his pocket. So I'll be busy."

"Greedy colonel," Maxwell sighs. She sneaks a look at Jacobi, the calm focus in his expression as he returns his attention to the road, and decides not to comment on the way his smile softens at the mention of Kepler's name, their synchronized exasperation at him. Part of her wonders when Jacobi's going to slip up around her and call him Warren.

"What about you?" he asks.

"I'll need to figure out how to get Olympia on their systems, but it shouldn't be too difficult. Dr. Tyson agreed that the computers will be bought by Newton, so the colonel won't have to cover that. I already gave him the list." Alana sinks into her seat, adjusting the seatbelt so it's not digging into her neck. Jacobi's not quite on the same page as her about AIs-- or at least, he's not quite as interested in their potential, but he's always willing to humor her. "Other than that, Hera mentioned wanting a bit more... corporeality."

"Uh, meaning?"

"Meaning," Hera pipes up, "Mr. Jacobi, that I miss having some control over my environment."

"You're building her a body?" he asks, then presses his lips together, fighting back a laugh. 

"Well, their shells can only do so much. I've upgraded a few times since we were on the Sol, but even then the movement options are limited and they can't exert much force."

"And the possibility of re-enacting the Terminator movies doesn't freak you out at all."

"If humans treated AIs fairly," Hera answers primly, "there'd be no reason for us to go Terminator on you."

Maxwell grins. "She makes a very solid point."

"So, what're you thinking?"

"Bipedalism is kind of a crapshoot, so we were thinking something four-legged." He nods at that, which Alana takes as her cue to go on. "Might be a little too similar to a dog, though, and I don't want people treating Hera like she's an animal."

"Humans are animals," Jacobi says. 

"Sure, but people do really heinous things to animals sometimes."

"People do really heinous things to each other, too," he points out, reminding her that the SI-5 is a prime example of people who do heinous things to other people. "Just give her some nice, sharp teeth."

"I kind of like that idea," Hera says.

"Or centaur-style," he adds.

"Humans think we all want to look like you and eventually blend in," Hera muses, "but I think practicality is my main concern. Being a fleshbag doesn't interest me, I just want _all the functions_."

Shaking his head, Jacobi lightly raps on the steering wheel. "Whoa," he says, putting on the most offended tone he can muster while trying not to laugh, "whoa, whoa, 'fleshbag'? Let's lay off that kinda language."

"Gladly," Hera snipes back, "when you stop referring to us as 'tin cans'."

Maxwell's already rolling her eyes, having been through this routine more than enough times to be sick of it. Jacobi and Hera seem to like it though, poking at each other's sore spots. "Sure," Daniel drawls, "when you stop being one."

"Well, you're never gonna stop being a fleshbag, so I guess we're even."

"That's pretty fair, actually." He taps Maxwell on the arm. "That should be a band name. The Fleshbags."

"Maybe you and Kepler can start one," she offers.

"You should bring it up with him," Jacobi says. "Then snap a picture of his face."

* * *

Warren's about three-quarters of the way down his to-do list, the contents of which include things such as 'have supplies sent to Newton' and 'memory matrix disgnostics for Invictus- attn Pryce'. He's working on one of the minor bullet points ('cable management for Hera's mainframe') when his phone begins to ring. There aren't many people with his new number, and the caller has set their own identity to private, as he has. Still, he answers, and it's Minkowski's voice over the line with a flat, "Hey, Kepler."

"Minkowski," he answers, perfectly cordial in return as he sets her to speaker and goes back to cable-tying USB cords behind a monitor. "Want me to forward you to Captain Lovelace?"

"I wanted to talk to you, actually. Just to let you know that I think we're ready to move out and meet up with you four."

Kepler mentally adds 'work out sleeping areas for three more heads' to the list and picks up the phone to address her properly. "Well," he says, "we're eager to have you. Need me to arrange a lift from Pennsylvania?"

"No, I can drive. We'll make a few stops along the way."

"You want me to--"

"Actually," Minkowski cuts him gently off before he can offer anything else, "I think I'm going to get back on my own feet. Driving us down to Florida would be a good start."

Warren's impulse to micromanage an unproven asset wars briefly with his love of delegating, but the latter eventually wins out. He can't know for sure how Minkowski will handle being back on Earth, but she'd proven to be competent enough in space. "Thanks for the advance notice," he says. "Hera should be able to navigate you here. Anything else?"

"I-- yeah. Yeah, that's all."

It's clearly not all, judging by the uncertain tone of her voice, but Kepler gives her a quick affirmative and moves to close the line. If someone chooses not to make something his problem, he has no intention of inviting it on himself. "Good hearing from you."

"Actually-- goddamnit, Kepler, wait."

Warren heaves a quiet sigh, his finger hovering over the red 'hang up' button. "Yes?"

"You're about my age, right?"

"A... pproximately."

"So we were in the military at about the same time?"

"Close enough." Warren tilts his head to the side. He'd moved into the private sector after a single deployment, already bored of the military routine. "You stuck with it longer than I did, though."

Kepler's heard plenty of people squirm on the other end of a call, but it's not usually self-inflicted. Still, Minkowski seems to wrestle with herself for a long moment before she screws up the nerve to ask, "So-- you, right now, you and Jacobi, how did you... how'd you come around to that?"

"Well," Kepler drawls, "we've got about six years of working together, though I know that doesn't always translate to--"

"Not that," Minkowski interrupts again, sounding impatient this time, "I mean with how things were in the military, and..."

"How did I come around to... men?"

"I-- yeah. If you don't... mind my asking."

Warren rubs his eyes, internally congratulating Lovelace but dreading the conversation he's about to have. For most of his childhood, he wouldn't have been allowed to serve, and by the time 'don't ask don't tell' was the word of the day, he would've been dishonorably discharged for even indicating interest in another man. Yet another reason he didn't stick around in the military. "This is the second time I'm having a conversation of this kind in as many days," he groans. "Is there something in the water?"

"It's probably because you and Jacobi are the only ones in any kind of relationship right now, and you seem to be handling it?"

Even Kepler will admit that 'handling it' is a bit of an overstatement, not that he'd ever say so to Minkowski. Questions about his personal life were almost nonexistent while he was with Goddard, but now they seem to come at him every single day. "There isn't really a meaningful difference to me," he says after a few seconds. "Socially and, until very recently, legally, the person you're with changes the way you can... move through life but there's enough variation in the _human experience_ that I wouldn't rule out a connection to someone of any gender."

"Really?" 

"After your experience on the Hephaestus, would you disagree?" Warren makes another mental note to wring a drink out of Lovelace for his excellent wingmanning. "Can't you see yourself, or at least, a version of yourself, who could be with just about anyone?"

"I mean," Minkowski says thoughtfully, "I think I'd have certain expectations from men that I wouldn't from other women, and vice versa. Do you have a type?"

"Independence, assertiveness and flexibility are important to me," he says lightly, "both personally and professionally." It's a true statement, as far as statements go, but it's certainly not any kind of revealing one. Kepler demands all those qualities from everyone he maintains a lasting correspondence with, and any sort of personal connections were set aside so he could properly do his job. "Is this the first time you're thinking about it?"

"No, but after I got married, it wasn't really an issue. I didn't imagine I'd have to think about it again. He was the one."

"You know, it's _really_ not too late--"

"He _was_ the one." Half a dozen rehashes, and Minkowski knows he's just trying to mitigate any emotional vulnerabilities in the team. It's not an altruistic offer, though it is a generous one, and she's learned not to regard _everything_ he does with suspicion. "I'm a different person now," she tells him, "and so is Dominik. I appreciate you giving me the chance to change my mind, but it's not going to happen."

Not pressing any further, Kepler allows a long silence to stand before he finally asks, "Are you looking for my input?" 

"Will I regret saying yes?"

"When you get out here tomorrow," Kepler says slowly, "I am going to book three tables at Khoresh, I'm gonna take us all out for dinner, and you and Captain Lovelace can talk about whatever you need to over the five-course prix fixe dinner for two you're gonna order." He waits a second to see whether or not she'll dispute the 'Captain Lovelace' part, and grins when no protest is forthcoming. "Non-negotiable."

"Three tables," Minkowski repeats.

"I also... owe Daniel a date."

"After you took Lovelace out on one and not him?"

"If we're gonna count dinner in the course of an operation as a 'date'," Warren says, "then I've gotta tell Jacobi that we've _been_ dating for six years so technically he owes _me_ a date, and he won't like that."

"Well," Minkowski answers, sounding significantly more amused now that it's not _her_ life under scrutiny, "it's not _just_ dinner, it's the dressing up, and the emotionally important conversations, and the deepening connection--"

"You will have your chance," Warren tells her. "You will eat delicious Persian food, get tipsy off a wine list curated specifically for your meal, talk about whatever you need to, and then however things shake out, you will have time and space to process it." 

"Why do so many of your plans involve alcohol?"

"And then," Kepler plows on, ignoring her to get to the crux of the matter, "once we're all settled in, we can get back on course with the main objective."

He _would_ know that a set plan and a timeline is a comfort to her, and Minkowski can't find it in herself to be angry about it. Is it worse to have a commander who understands nothing and demands mediocrity, or a commander who understands _everything_ but demands the impossible? It's irrelevant, because Kepler isn't her commander anymore, but Jacobi's loyalty is suddenly making an uncomfortable amount of sense. "I guess I should've guessed from your taste in whiskey that you're kind of a foodie, huh?"

Kepler's line of work necessitated taste, knowledge and experience with luxuries to bait in potential opportunities. Expensive drinks, brand-name clothes and accessories were all things he learned to enjoy from Marcus Cutter, from the first time Cutter tweaked the lapel of his jacket and lamented about the material to the last time they'd strolled out of Valentino together. Maybe Maxwell wasn't too far off the mark about his first restaurant job. 

"I am a man of simple pleasures," Kepler answers, and after a momentary self-assessment, concludes that it's true. Warren Kepler likes to eat, and he likes to eat well. 

"Okay," Minkowski scoffs, clearly disbelieving. "I'll take your word for it. See you soon, Kepler."

* * *

Sometime after lunch, Lovelace walks into the wrong apartment. Well-- she walks into _an_ apartment, glimpses a man with a small child in a high chair, and immediately backs out of it to check the number on the door. 

Stepping back in, having confirmed that she has found the right place and that it is, in fact, Kepler in the apartment cajoling a toddler into eating a spoonful of mushy peas, she warily approaches while he looks on in amusement. "Can I help you?" he says, acting for all the world as if there's nothing out of the ordinary.

"Uh, Kepler?"

"Yes?"

"Whose child did you kidnap?"

"You remember Mrs. Perez?" he asks, picking up a sippy cup of juice and handing it to the child when it reaches for it. "From downstairs?"

"Who?"

"Couple days ago, in the gym."

"You kidnapped _her_ kid?" Lovelace gasps, horrified.

"No," he growls, "I'm _babysitting_ her granddaughter. Both parents work, so she usually watches her, but she's got a doctor's appointment today."

"Why?"

"Mrs. Perez makes some mean lemon squares."

Lovelace squints at him, then the child. "She's not crying at all," she says, sounding surprised. "Are you secretly good with children?"

"Well," he says, indicating a diaper bag on the counter with a tilt of his head, "babies cry because it's the only way they can ask for something, and it's usually some kind of toss-up between food, gassy, diaper, or nap. Much like the babysitting I did on the Hephaestus," he drawls, "even _difficult_ children have simple needs." 

"See," she says, "I thought you would've been Team 'let babies cry it out'."

"A kid cries, doesn't get results, it's gonna learn other ways to get what it wants." He looks at the toddler again, expression serious as he delivers another spoonful of mush into her mouth. "You teach someone that they have to lie and cheat and steal to survive, can you guess what they're gonna get really good at?"

There's a crack at the tip of Lovelace's tongue, and she's sure that Kepler would find it funny, but she bites it back. She knows just enough about him to know that whatever childhood he'd had, it isn't one that he'd inflict on anyone else. "Kepler..."

"I'm doing this for the sake of our collective sanity," he continues matter-of-factly. "If this kid learns to get the fridge door open, we're done for."

"Sure," Lovelace says as the baby pushes the last spoonful of peas away, grimacing, and Kepler mirrors the expression. "I'm gonna get out of your hair. Just came back to grab my phone charger."

"Don't forget a lemon square," he calls after her. With that brief misdirection, he manages to get the peas into the baby's mouth. Before she can kick up a fuss about it, Kepler lifts her out of the high chair and swings her up onto his shoulders. He keeps one hand on the kid's back, holding her upright, and bounces lightly on his heels. "Also, Minkowski's arriving tomorrow with Eiffel and Pryce."

"Wait, really?"

"Yeah."

"She didn't tell me that."

"Well, it sounded like she made up her mind this morning."

"Okay." Lovelace watches Kepler rock back and forth on his heels, all to entertain the toddler on his shoulders, and his grimace when the baby slaps sticky little hands on his forehead. "You good with the baby?"

"I'm good."

"Then I'm gonna keep going with this supplies list." It really is too easy to take things in stride when Kepler's being nonchalant about it. Lovelace makes a mental note to check in with Mrs. Perez later, just to make sure she's gotten her grandchild back. "Still need a number for a body armor vendor."

"Vic? Send her the contact labeled 'W-A-V'. Underground dealer called Anton Hooke. Tell him you're calling on behalf of Arthur Keller and he'll get us what we need. He won't ask questions."

"Alright." Pausing in the doorway, Lovelace takes one last look at Kepler. Whatever motive he has for taking care of his neighbor's kid for a few hours, he doesn't seem inclined to share. The alternative is that left to his own devices, he just volunteers for menial tasks out of boredom, and Isabel is almost too afraid to ask. "Keller one of your aliases?" she says instead.

"One of Cutter's."

"Huh. Okay. See you at dinner."

* * *

A while after the sun's gone down, Kepler and Lovelace are back at the island, their heads bent over a blueprint of both apartments and the list of supplies. There's a stack of boxes and paper-wrapped packages by the couch-- Lovelace's haul-- and containers of food neatly packed and cooling by the sink. "Minkowski's arriving in the afternoon," Kepler says, indicating a little note he'd scrawled in the margins of the blueprint, "and the supplies you picked up today about wraps up our inventory. There's another office in the mainframe room, and an alcove large enough to fit a cot and a desk."

"For Eiffel?"

"Yeah." Kepler taps the spot on the blueprint. "Doctors Maxwell and Pryce can set the office up for their quarters, and Minkowski can have Maxwell's current bed."

Taking that in, Lovelace eventually turns suspicious, narrowed eyes on him. "You're splitting up my crew," she says, just a bit accusingly.

"Is that a problem?" Kepler asks. "I'm splitting up my team, too."

"It's kind of a problem."

Negotiating with Lovelace has become rote procedure now, and despite his insistence on efficiency, Warren will admit that her input usually smooths things over for the rest of the crew. "I was hoping to have the computer specialists closer to the AIs," he explains. 

"You want to put all the most vulnerable members of the team in one place?"

"I'd argue that Maxwell is more than enough firepower to keep the rest of that apartment safe," Kepler says, "but if you'd rather take an office with Minkowski to stay close to Eiffel, that's fine." Maxwell really hasn't had any opportunities to show off her marksmanship chops, though Kepler's sure that when she does, Lovelace will never question her ability to defend a position again. 

"Okay," says Isabel, even as she mentally files away the fact that Maxwell's an offensive powerhouse, "let's do that."

Both of them look up at the sound of keys in the door, falling silent as Jacobi and Maxwell step through. "Hey," Jacobi calls out, "we're back."

Lovelace gives them a wave, bemused at the disheveled state of their clothes. "How was work?" They'd even left the apartment dressed professionally that morning, but now Jacobi's got his sleeves rolled up, soot and chemical stains on his light blue button-down. Maxwell's got fresh band-aids on two of her fingers, and seems to be coated in a light layer of dust. 

"It was good," Jacobi answers, unrolling his sleeves and peeling off his dress shirt to stand in the soft gray tee he'd picked out of Warren's closet that morning. Kepler's not prone to sentimentality, but Jacobi can see the colonel watching him, a familiar gleam in his eyes. "What'd you guys get up to?"

"Oh," says Kepler, his nonchalant tone in stark contrast to the intensity of his stare, "this and that. Sitrep?"

"Newton had the parts I ordered before I even got there." Maxwell grins, clearly ecstatic with the state of things at Newton. It's not Goddard; the facilities a little older, a little less shiny, but perfectly serviceable for her needs. "Everything's assembled and networked now," she reports, "just waiting for AIs."

"Tyson had a team help me bring the lab up to code," Jacobi chimes in, "so it's all ready to go on my end, too. I can get the first batch out tomorrow."

"Is there anything we should know for tomorrow, sir?"

"I'll be setting up space for Minkowski, Pryce and Eiffel. They'll rendezvous with us in the afternoon, right here."

"About time." Jacobi indicates the plastic bag dangling off Maxwell's arm with his chin. "Me and Maxwell stopped at a Cheesecake Factory on the way back, you two eat yet?"

"We're good," says Lovelace.

Happily unloading their haul into the fridge, Maxwell sings a quiet "Midnight snacks for Maxwell~" under her breath and grabs a container of orange juice. She meets Kepler's eyes as she uncaps it, like a cat pushing a priceless family heirloom off a shelf, and drinks straight from carton. "Feel free to dig in if you get hungry," she says, passing the juice to Jacobi so he can finish off the rest of it, which he does. 

"I'm gonna go get cleaned up," Daniel says, dunking the empty carton into the trash, and he holds Warren's gaze for a few seconds before he ducks into their room.

Kepler slides off his seat, giving the paperwork a last cursory once-over. "You need anything else," he says, fixing Lovelace with a pointed look, "Captain?"

"No."

"Maxwell."

"I'll write up a report." She flashes him a mischievous smile. "Jacobi's been _dying_ to debrief you, though."

Kepler's mouth opens in a small 'o' of feigned surprise, and he swipes his pen off the counter as he heads for the door of the bedroom. "Well," he says, "I am eager to be _debriefed_." Then, under his breath: "Hopefully in more ways than one."

The door shuts behind Kepler and a few seconds later, something hits the other side of it. The lock clicks. 

* * *

"Missed you too," Daniel murmurs, his back pressed to the door. His shoulders draw up at the series of rough kisses delivered to his neck along the path of his carotid artery, hands curling into the material of Warren's shirt and pulling him even closer. "But unless you want to go to the ER for ingesting ammonium nitrate, I need... nnh, a shower."

"Is that what that is?" Kepler makes a face as he pulls back, perfectly content to keep Daniel pinned against the door with his hip. "It's toxic, isn't it?"

"If you eat enough of it." Curling his arms around Kepler's neck, Daniel grins as the colonel leans in for another kiss, this one deep and slow. Warren pulls back with a playful bite to Daniel's bottom lip, and hooks a finger into his belt loop to haul him toward the bathroom. "But if you're feeling dangerous tonight," Daniel quips, laughing even as he's backed up against the marble counter of the vanity, "help yourself."

Warren gives him an exasperated look, pausing momentarily in his current pursuit of getting Daniel out of his shirt, the hem already untucked and bunched up in his hands. "Pass," he says. Then, "Arms."

Daniel raises his arms, screwing his eyes shut as Warren removes his shirt, then his own. He blinks them open just to refocus on Kepler in the warm vanity lights, his hands coming down to muss his dark hair and run his fingers through it, pulling the strands out of his meticulously styled quiff. "God," Daniel breathes, running his hands down Warren's neck, his collar, the hard planes of his stomach, "Warren, you know the shit some guys do just to look like you? And you're out here making pancakes every morning."

Arms on either side of him, Warren leans in to steal another kiss. When he breaks this one, he bumps their foreheads together, cold, gray eyes locked on Daniel's. "Guess I got lucky," he says, all cheeky arrogance, no sign of that unnerving, cautious deliberation, but the arms he wraps around the small of Daniel's back say that he's not referring to the kind of luck good genes granted him.

The casual lie shouldn't be reassuring but it is; Warren Kepler has never put much stock in luck. Only statistics, and choice, and he'd chosen Daniel over and over again.

"No kidding," Daniel sighs, and he knows Warren can feel him grinning against his collar. 


	19. Chapter 19

Minkowski, Eiffel and Pryce get a grand total of an hour in the apartment to drop off their belongings and clean up before Kepler's whisking them all back out the door and into the car for dinner. It's a short drive to the restaurant; the host blatantly recognizes Kepler but checks his reservation and calls him _Mr. Carver_ with a smile. 

"So," Kepler says to Jacobi as they're shown to their seats, "I _was_ gonna book us our own table, but then I realized that Eiffel and Pryce would be experiencing Persian food for the first time, and--"

Daniel stops him with a hand on his wrist, the crooked grin on his face. Kepler rarely bothers to explain himself when plans change, expecting his team to roll with it and follow his lead, but he _had_ promised a date at _some_ point. Daniel's not so sensitive that he'd take another deferral personally-- besides, seeing Eiffel and Pryce reacquaint themselves with various cuisines is pretty good entertainment. "It's okay," he says. "I get it."

Pryce doesn't seem interested in the menu, a pair of sunglasses perched on the bridge of her nose while she browses her phone. She's not particularly concerned about the other patrons-- at least in terms of their comfort with the state of her eyes, but the attention of Goddard and its competitors is still a risk, and not one she plans to exacerbate.

Eiffel's already in his chair, scanning the menu. Only a few months of Kepler's attention and he's unconsciously checking points of entry, picking up the subtle undercurrent of paranoia that the SI-5 maintains. "Get what?" he asks, looking up at Kepler and Jacobi as they squeeze into the booth next to him.

"He likes introducing people to new cuisines," Maxwell chimes in, sitting across from Eiffel and shifting the seat beside her for Pryce. "I actually think it's how he shows affection."

Kepler ignores the second part of Maxwell's statement. "It's great when you can _see_ someone's world get a little bigger," he says, and waves a server over to order without consulting anyone else at the table. He even catches Minkowski's eye, gesturing for her to relax and let him handle the food.

"The boys made me try Korean barbecue for the first time," Alana adds, extending her foot under the table and gently kicking Jacobi's ankle. "It was amazing."

Daniel sneaks a glance at Kepler, who's now laughing with their server and sharing memories of the Tehran Bazaar, no doubt trying to score them a few extras on the house. "I had Thai food for the first time with him," Jacobi says. "And pho."

Maxwell raises her fork, turning it in her hand. "Falafel in Lebanon, too." 

The server leaves, and Jacobi grimaces at Maxwell. "You never had falafel before Kepler?"

"Remember hotpot in Szechuan?" Warren offers, dropping into the conversation as if he'd been a part of it the whole time. "That was a _night_."

"I think I hallucinated a talking British pig?" Alana murmurs. "Honestly, it was a blur."

"I remember four hours on the toilet," sighs Jacobi, and before Kepler can start on him again, he elbows the other man in the ribs. "For the record," he announces, "I can _handle_ spicy, that wasn't _spicy_ , that was chemically _setting your insides on fire_."

"You liked it, though."

"Yeah, I _really_ liked it."

Eiffel makes a face at him. He likes most food just fine-- anything salty, greasy and fried had been welcomed with open arms, but he'd tried one packet of spicy instant noodles and swore off them forever, not one to enjoy food with a side of _pain_. "Seriously?" 

Giving him a pitying look, Daniel shakes his head. "What part of 'chemically setting your insides on fire' sounds like something I wouldn't like?"

* * *

Lovelace grins as Minkowski slides into the booth across from her, and she cranes her head around the seat to meet Eiffel's eye. "Hey," she says cheerfully, "we got our own table. I can see why Kepler wants to sit with the rest of the group, though."

Normally, being around Lovelace makes Renee calmer, the captain's easy confidence and humor keeping things light. Now she seems blissfully unaware of Minkowski's nerves, picking up a menu and flipping through it despite Kepler's assurances. "Yeah," Minkowski says, slowly. "I actually wanted to... talk to you about something. We can move tables in a second."

Setting down the menu, Lovelace is instantly alert, quickly scoping out the restaurant before turning her attention onto Minkowski. "Are you alright? Is something up?"

"Nothing's wrong. It's not that serious, I promise."

Isabel settles down, turning the full force of her attentive focus on Minkowski. "Okay," she says, "I'm listening."

Given the frayed state of her nerves, Minkowski internally pats herself on the back for having rehearsed this conversation already. She didn't come in with notes, but it was a close decision. "Over the last two years," she recites, "I realize that I've been relying on you. A lot. And you've never complained about it, and that's insane."

Lovelace's expression clears, a look of _oh, we're having That kind of conversation_ appearing on her face. She props her chin on the heel of the palm and grins. "What's there to complain about?"

"Having to command a station when you didn't have to," Minkowski clarifies, painfully earnest, "especially _that_ station, it's not something I could've trusted with anyone else." Imploringly: "And I know you're just going to brush it off, because that's the kind of person you are, but I just wanted you to know how much I-- how much I appreciate and admire you."

"Well," Isabel replies, slowly but clearly, "I appreciate your appreciation, and admiration, and I feel the same about you. Mutual admiration is great."

"And," Minkowski adds, committing to the sentence before she can lose her nerve, "I also wanted to take this chance to let you know that, it's not _just_ admiration, Captain, but I have, um, feelings. For you."

Blinking, Lovelace gives her a cheerful smile. "What kind of feelings?"

"What kind--" Minkowski sputters, a look of pure fear back in her eyes, "the kind of feelings that aren't strictly-- well--"

"I'm kidding! I'm kidding." Isabel picks up a spoon, scraping the edge of its bowl against the tablecloth just for something to do with her hands. "I like you too," she says in a conspiratorial murmur, leaning forward. "Like, _like_ like."

"And," Minkowski says, stiff and strangled, "is that something you might be open to exploring further?"

"Very yes."

"Okay. Wow."

"You good?"

"Yes, sir." As if just registering her own words, Minkowski throws both hands up, gesturing for Lovelace not to comment on the slip. "I mean," she says, scrambling to self-correct, "Captain. Captain Lovelace."

"Isabel," says Lovelace, very slowly. She presses her lips together, visibly suppressing a laugh.

"Right. Isabel."

The server comes back with their drinks, a glass each of a rich, red wine. Lovelace clears her arms off the table to make room, and waits for him to leave before she addresses Minkowski again. "You want to take this a little slow?" 

"That would be great," Minkowski answers, her words tumbling out in a rush, "honestly. If that's okay with you."

"Yeah, that's okay with me."

They lapse into another awkward silence, both nursing their drinks. Minkowski only distantly registers the deep, fruity aroma of the wine, still caught up in replaying their conversation in her mind, but Lovelace seems able to fully appreciate it. She sniffs it, warms the bowl of the glass in the palm of her hand and takes a luxurious sip. 

After a few more moments of this, Minkowski sets down her glass. "Can I hold your hand," she says, once Lovelace does the same, "or is that too forward?"

"Whoa," Isabel laughs, corners of her eyes crinkling in what Minkowski hopes a little desperately is delight, "whoa, I thought we agreed to keep this slow."

"No, of course, that's-- oh."

"Sorry," Lovelace murmurs, her ankle hooking behind Minkowski's under the table and drawing her foot closer, the skin of her ankle warm and smooth against Minkowski's. Her dark curls fall into her face, accentuating the soft, mischievous smile. "Jokes again. It's how I cope with nerves."

Searching her eyes, Minkowski begrudgingly notes that whatever unease Lovelace is feeling, she's not showing a hint of it in those deep brown irises. "You're nervous? I can't tell at all."

"Oh. My disguise is working."

"Me too."

Lovelace reaches across the table first, gently covering Minkowski's hand with her own. "We've been out of the game for way too long, huh?"

"Maybe." This is far from the first time they've touched each other's hands, but Minkowski still wonders at the strength of those deft fingers, the soft skin of her wrist and the calluses on her palms. "You still want to join the other table?"

"Nah. I kinda like it right here."

* * *

The group trickles back to the apartment at a leisurely pace, Kepler and Jacobi bringing up the front with Maxwell. She looks up as they enter the apartment, sniffs the air and turns to Jacobi. "What's that smell?"

"What smell?"

"Oh, I don't know." Alana moves aside to let the rest of the group into the apartment, Pryce heading for one bedroom while the Hephaestus crew lingers in the living room, scattering to the couches. "I just thought I smelled something," she says, brows furrowing.

"Vic," says Kepler, catching Maxwell's eye as Jacobi immediately runs his hand along the bottom edge of his closest coffee table, then under the cushions of the couch, "was anyone in either of these apartments?"

Maxwell listens to her earpiece for a second. "No. No one's been in or out of here since we left."

"Then there's nothing to worry about," Warren murmurs, eyes still locked on Maxwell. She gives him a minute shake of the head, a discreet hand signal, and Kepler faces the rest of the group with an easy smile. Maxwell's sight is flawless, but her sensitivity to smells is first-rate, too; Jacobi likes a strong cheese, but it wouldn't have affected an average roommate. "Let's all turn in," Kepler announces to the group as Minkowski and Lovelace both put a wary hand on their pistols, the weapons tucked in their respective waistband holsters. 

"It is getting pretty late," Lovelace offers. She tracks Jacobi in her periphery as he ducks into his and Warren's bedroom and Maxwell unfolds a keyboard on the coffee table, sitting directly on the floor in front of it. She gestures for Minkowski to sweep the other space with her.

Kepler gives Lovelace a nod before he makes his way to the kitchen and starts checking the cupboards. Hopefully they've all taken the hint that no one will be using names until given the all-clear. "Whoever went grocery shopping last time: We need to have a chat about our inventory. I saw you picked up the generic brand detergent instead of the one I listed, is there a reason for that?"

"Yes sir," Alana answers, her voice shockingly meek for someone whose hands are a blur as she types. "The generic was on sale."

Plucking a little microphone from the underside of a jar of marmalade, Kepler tucks the bug into his pocket and starts sifting through the drawers. Pryce joins them rather abruptly, brandishing a microphone of her own and setting it on the table in front of Maxwell before she retreats back into the bedroom. "Sale or not," Warren chides, "I put 'Dawn' on the list, and I expect that to be what you bring back."

"Don't you always say that budgetary concerns should be our concern too?" Maxwell looks up when Jacobi comes out of his room, something clutched in his hand. There's a red indicator blinking on her screen. "That we should be considerate of our financial situation when we make choices?"

"Sure, but I'd already _accounted_ for a certain expenditure--" The light turns green and Kepler instantly cuts himself off. "Okay. Invictus, you know what to do. We're compromised? Is it Newton? Halloway?"

Maxwell regards the microphones in front of her, and gives Lovelace and Minkowski a cheerful wave as they return with a few bugs of their own. "We seem to just be under audio surveillance for the time being," she observes. "They were able to stop Hera from reporting the intrusion and overwrite the memory in her database, but they weren't able to cover their tracks. It has to be Goddard. No one at Newton and Halloway has the programming chops to pull that off."

"Someone was in my head _again_? Alana--"

Maxwell looks at Kepler, then shifts her gaze to Hera's shell before he can say or do anything. "I can revert you to before they ever touched you, Hera. Do you want me to do that?"

"Can you recover the data without having to revert me?"

"It'll take a few minutes more, but--" 

"Do it," Kepler says, impatient, but the tension in the set of his mouth slackens a little when Jacobi sidles up next to him and leans into his side. 

"Sure you don't want me to toss these in the microwave?" Daniel asks, and grins at the way Kepler shifts, as if fitting himself more comfortably against Daniel's shoulder. 

"I'm sure," he answers. "Invictus is already running interference protocols."

Minkowski exchanges a look with Eiffel, two of them having actively avoided being _in the loop_ for the last week. "Interference protocols?" she asks.

Maxwell takes a deep breath. 

"Keep it simple for us," Kepler reminds her gently, "doctor."

"Well... it's a little complicated," Maxwell sighs, still typing, "but he's got recordings of hundreds of conversations between us all--"

"We're still being bugged?" Minkowski asks.

"And he has records of our average day," says Maxwell, "average activities, time spent in each room-- basically, he's got our habits nailed. So he's playing old conversations that have been scrubbed of any crucial information, with... well, quite a lot of data replaced with his own recordings of our voices--"

" _And_ we're being impersonated?" Eiffel squawks.

"With just enough information to _seem_ relevant but not enough to give away any of our preparations." Maxwell beams at them. "Basically he's replaying a bunch of pre-wrtitten scripts into these bugs that lets whoever's surveilling us _think_ they know what we're saying and doing, but we're actually feeding them information that's totally useless. He can even differentiate between which bugs were placed in each room, and throw off infrared sensors."

"And you just had all this ready to go," Minkowski says, pinning Lovelace with a betrayed look when the woman seems completely unsurprised. Lovelace gives her an exaggerated shrug, an expression of _I didn't know either, but are you really surprised?_ on her face.

"It's S-O-P," Kepler says.

"Terrifying," quips Eiffel, though he's smiling.

Turning to Maxwell again, Kepler indicates the other room with a tilt of his head. "In the meantime, I don't think the kids are safe here."

"Transferring them to the... alternate servers now," Maxwell reports as she starts a program to move them to Newton's servers, the newly-assembled systems at the other company. "I've encrypted and partitioned their data, and everything they get here will be backed up there. They still have access to these mainframes, but the core personality and memory matrices... will be housed somewhere more secure."

"First batch of small-scale and close-range grenades are done too," Jacobi pipes up, "in the trunk of the car."

"Who could've pulled off something like this?" Minkowski wonders aloud. She hadn't expected to return to a compromised apartment the _day_ they arrive back in Florida, but at least the time they'd spent in Pennsylvania could be considered an adequate rest period.

"SI-4, probably." Kepler glances at the microphones, counting them. "If they're doing recon, they don't know who's here just yet. Whoever broke in did a good job not leaving a trace, but Baudin likes a strong aftershave. He's the most precise ballistics specialist left at Goddard, so he stayed on the team. That might've given them away." 

"He's not _that_ good," Jacobi grumbles, but he doesn't suppress his smirk when Warren bumps him on the shoulder. 

"Cutter wasn't the only higher-up who was in the loop, but he did direct the vision of the company." Kepler seems relaxed now, after the initial rush of adrenaline. "We've kept up check-ins, but someone might be making a power play, since he's been in space for so long. Board might be getting restless. I wanted to leave the apartment empty for a bit and see if we were being surveilled."

Lovelace scoffs. Of _course_ Kepler wasn't just taking them out to dinner. Of _course_ he'd have some motive other than giving her and Minkowski a chance to talk. She can't deny the efficiency, though.

"Any guesses as to who?" asks Maxwell.

"I have an idea, but that's not our priority right now." Checking his watch, Kepler glances around the room, meeting the eyes of each crewmember as he does. "There's a pretty good spot to set up infrareds across the street, so assume we're being watched. Vic should be taking care of that, but our workarounds are still untested. They'll probably move tonight, the moment we're all asleep."

"So let's get out of here," suggests Eiffel.

"No. We go to bed."

"Um, Kepler--"

"Yes, Minkowski?"

"Are you _crazy_?"

"If they see us scrambling to leave," Kepler says, "that'll tip them off and we'll be on the run. If they come in expecting us to be fast asleep, we'll have the element of surprise. Simple as that." It's bait, is what it is. There's a look on his face that's been sorely absent for a long time, shrewd and predatory. 

While Daniel isn't ecstatic about the idea of being used as a lure for the second-most deadly team of Goddard Intelligence operatives, he's not going to complain about Colonel Warren Kepler making a reappearance, kicking a carefully planned operation into gear. "I'm turning in, then," he says, leaving Warren with a squeeze to his elbow and ruffling Maxwell's hair as he passes behind her.

"Okay," says Lovelace.

Minkowski makes a choking sound. " _Okay_?"

"Minkowski and I can hold the fort in the computer room," Lovelace says. "You three cover Pryce. They've proven they can get in without tripping the AIs' alarms, so we need to keep our guard up."

"Don't shoot the mainframes," Maxwell reminds them, packing up her tablet and keyboard. "The transfer should be done in about an hour."

"Everything according to routine. Go." Kepler turns to Lovelace just as she finishes whispering something to Minkowski. Neither of them look happy, their faces grim, but Minkowski fixes Lovelace with a fierce, protective glare that melts into a smile when Lovelace winks at her. Warren waits for Minkowski to leave the apartment with Eiffel before he addresses Lovelace again. "Captain, a word?"

"Yeah, let's talk."

* * *

There was a time when Jacobi spent pretty much all his time around Kepler relaxed, head empty except for whatever explosives-, admin- or engineering-related directive he was given; Lately, he finds himself missing those simpler days. The big drawback of being looped into Warren's plans is being informed about all the ways it can go wrong, every potential point of failure. Awareness of dozens of factors that had never even crossed his mind before, because Kepler had already considered them and taken care of it. 'Need to know' used to chafe and still would, all things considered, but Daniel can admit to himself when that policy made his job easier. 

He must be showing it on his face, because Kepler crawls into bed next to him with a too-casual, "Something bothering you, Sunshine?" and slides under the covers. 

The nickname makes Daniel roll his eyes, never one for terms of endearment, though he's slowly coming around to the idea that Kepler might be. He had assumed that Warren was playing it up for his sake, putting on yet another facade, but the idea that the other man just _likes_ to be close, likes to touch him, likes to sleep curled up around him and call him stupid petnames makes Daniel light-headed. "Never better," Jacobi shoots back, wondering if he's finally starting to see through to Warren Kepler. 

At this point in their routine, Daniel's usually got his face tucked against Warren's neck, half-sprawled over him, but he's running through scenarios in his head, barely paying attention to the man next to him until Kepler impatiently catches his wrist and pulls him close. 

"Clingy," Daniel teases, though he rests his head against Warren's shoulder and closes his eyes. 

"Just trying real hard not to get vented out an airlock," Kepler whispers back, ducking his head to press a kiss to Jacobi's temple. He lingers there for a moment, breath warm against his ear. Then finally-- "What's wrong, Daniel?"

"I mean." Sighing, Daniel sits upright again. It's too difficult to be anxious about the operation when he's _this_ cozy, and he wryly notes that he can't seem to hide anything from Warren, either. "The last time we did this 'wait and see' thing..."

"We had the upper hand, yes. And?"

"C'mon, Warren." _That's not what this is about and you know it._

"I know these clowns," Warren tells him. "I taught 'em everything they know."

"We thought we knew _them_ , too."

Expression softening, Warren lowers his voice. "Maxwell will be fine," he says. He'd made sure this time around to keep her far away from the front lines of this operation, setting her right where she's safest and most effective: behind the scenes with a computer in her hand. 

The Hephaestus had seemed jinxed for Maxwell in ways that it hadn't for the other two members of the SI-5, no matter how much she insists that jinxes are stupid. The first time she'd ever been rendered unconscious on an assignment was when an electrical discharge knocked her out in Standard Lab 7, her first collapse from exhaustion after digging into Hera's personality matrix. Getting shot in the head. Kepler isn't _obvious_ about it the way Jacobi might be a little obvious about it, but one glance at his latest checklist told Daniel that it still weighed on him.

"Can I get that in writing?" Daniel jokes, and meets Kepler's frown with a scowl of his own.

"This is just like the operations we've always done," Warren says, low and dangerously cool. He hasn't really lost his temper in a while, but the icy inflection in his tone is one of those warning signs Jacobi'd long since learned to watch out for. He put on a show for the crew of the Hephaestus, but Kepler, truly angry, is cold. People usually die. "You know that. There's no guarantee any of us will get out of this in one piece, and there never was."

Daniel flashes him a humorless grin. "You really know how to make a guy relax, Warren."

"But," he continues, "I'm doing everything in my _extensive_ power to make sure that we do. Okay?" Kepler waits for Daniel's soft affirmative to flip off his desk lamp, and they draw together in the dark. Warren's still in his jeans and socks, ready to roll out of bed and do immediate violence to trespassers. Daniel had watched him tuck his gun into the space between headboard and mattress, and he can feel the hard, warm metal of a folded knife in Kepler's back pocket when he slips his hand into it.

Daniel mumbles another, less serious complaint into Kepler's chest, their knees brushing against each other's under the light blanket drawn over both of them. "Dunno why you need all this stuff," he says, "like you couldn't kill a guy with your bare hands."

"Go to sleep, Daniel."

**Author's Note:**

> hmu on twitter @shinrainc


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